THE WORLD’S LAST WILDERNESS REVEALED
INTRODUCTION BY
FABIEN COUSTEAU
OC O CEAN
SENIOR EDITORS
Peter Frances, Angeles Gavira Guerrero
SENIOR ART EDITOR
Ina Stradins PROJECT ART EDITORS
Rob Houston
Peter Laws, Kenny Grant, Maxine Lea, Mark Lloyd
EDITORS
DESIGNERS Francis Wong,
PROJECT EDITOR
Rebecca Warren, Miezan van Zyl, Ruth O’Rourke, Amber Tokeley, Christine Heilman INDEXERS
Sue Butterworth, John Dear PROOF-READERS
Polly Boyd, Ben Hoare
Matt Schofield, Steve Knowlden CARTOGRAPHERS Roger Bullen, Paul Eames, David Roberts. Iowerth Watkins DTP DESIGNERS Julian Dams,
Laragh Kedwell JACKET DESIGNERS Lee Ellwood,
Sharon Spencer
SCHERMULY DESIGN COMPANY SENIOR EDITOR
DESIGNERS
Cathy Meeus
Dave Ball, Lee Riches, Steve Woosnam-Savage
ART EDITOR
Hugh Schermuly
CARTOGRAPHER Sally Geeve
EDITORS
DESIGN ASSISTANT
Gill Pitts, Paul Docherty
Tom Callingham
PICTURE RESEARCHER Louise Thomas
CONTENTS
LONDON, NEW YORK, MELBOURNE, MUNICH AND DELHI
about this book
6
foreword by fabien cousteau
8
INTRODUCTION OCEAN WATER
30
the properties of water
32
the chemistry of seawater
34
temperature and salinity
36
light and sound
38
OCEAN GEOLOGY
40
the formation of earth
42
the origin of oceans and continents
44
the evolution of the oceans
46
tectonics and the ocean floor
50
CIRCULATION AND CLIMATE
52
ocean winds ILLUSTRATORS Mick Posen (the Art Agency), John Woodcock,
John Plumer, Barry Croucher (the Art Agency), Planetary Visions PRODUCTION CONTROLLER Joanna Bull
54
surface currents
58
underwater circulation
60
the global water cycle
64
MANAGING EDITORS Sarah Larter, Liz Wheeler
oceans and climate
66
MANAGING ART EDITOR Philip Ormerod
el niño and la niña
68
PUBLISHING DIRECTOR Jonathan Metcalf
hurricanes and typhoons
70
TIDES AND WAVES
74
ART DIRECTOR Bryn Walls
CONSULTANT John Sparks First American Edition, 2006 Published in the United States by DK Publishing, 375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014 Copyright © 2006 Dorling Kindersley Limited 06 07 08 09 10 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. Published in Great Britain by Dorling Kindersley Limited. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Ocean. -- 1st American ed. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 0-7566-2205-0 1. Ocean. I. DK Publishing. GC21.O23 2006 551.46--dc22 2006010469
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ocean waves
76
tides
78
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS COASTS AND THE SEASHORE coasts and sea-level change
86 88
coastal landscapes
92
beaches and dunes
106
estuaries and lagoons
114
salt marshes and tidal flats
124
mangrove swamps
130
OCEAN LIFE INTRODUCTION TO OCEAN LIFE 204
bryozoans
307
echinoderms
308
small, bottom-living phyla
315
planktonic phyla
319 320
138
classification
206
140
cycles of life and energy
212
tunicates and lancelets
142
swimming and drifting
214
jawless fishes
322
sandy seabeds
144
bottom living
216
cartilaginous fishes
324
seagrass beds and kelp forests
zones of ocean life
218
bony fishes
338
146
ocean migrations
220
reptiles
372
coral reefs
152
living down deep
222
birds
382
the pelagic zone
164
bioluminescence
224
mammals
404
the history of ocean life
226
KINGDOMS OF OCEAN LIFE
230
SHALLOW SEAS continental shelves rocky seabeds
THE OPEN OCEAN AND OCEAN FLOOR
166
zones of the open ocean
168
bacteria and archaea
232
seamounts and guyots
174
protists
234
the continental slope and rise
176
ocean-floor sediments
180
abyssal plains, trenches, and mid-ocean ridges
182
vents and seeps
red and brown seaweeds
238
OCEANS OF THE WORLD
plant life
246
THE ARCTIC OCEAN
428
248
THE ATLANTIC OCEAN
432
green algae
250
THE INDIAN OCEAN
450
mosses
251
THE PACIFIC OCEAN
460
252
THE SOUTHERN OCEAN
482
green seaweeds
188 flowering plants fungi
THE POLAR OCEANS ice shelves icebergs sea ice polar ocean circulation
190
ATLAS OF THE OCEANS 426
256
animal life
258
glossary
488
sponges
260
index
494
cnidarians
262
atlas index
505
flatworms
273
acknowledgments
510
ribbon worms
275
segmented worms
276
mollusks
278
arthropods
292
192 194 198 200
FOREWORD
W
e should call our planet Ocean. A small orb floating in the endless darkness of space, it is a beacon of life in the otherwise forbidding cold of the endless universe. Against all odds, it is also the Petri dish from which all life known to us springs. Without water, our planet would be just one of billions of lifeless rocks floating endlessly in the vastness of the inky-black void. Even statisticians revel in the improbability that it exists at all, with such a rich abundance of life, much less that we as a species survive on its surface. Yet, despite the maze of improbability, we have somehow found our way to where we are today. Humans were enchanted by the sea even before the Greek poet Homer wrote his epic tale of ocean adventure, the Odyssey. It is this fascination that has driven us to delve into this foreign realm in search of answers, but the sea has always been reluctant to give up its secrets easily. Even with the monumental achievements of past explorers, scientists, and oceanographers, we have barely ventured through its surface. It is estimated that over 90 percent of the world’s biodiversity resides in its oceans. From the heartbeat-like pulsing of the jellyfish to the life-and-death battle between an octopus and a mantis shrimp, discoveries await us at every turn. And for every mystery solved, a dozen more present themselves. These are certainly exciting times as we dive into the planet’s final frontier. Aided by new technology, we can now explore beyond the two percent or so of the oceans that previous generations observed. But even with the advent of modern technology, it will take several more generations to achieve a knowledge base similar to the one we have about the land. No matter how remote we feel we are from the oceans, every act each one of us takes in our everyday lives affects our planet’s water cycle and in return affects us. All the water that falls on land, from the highest peaks to the flattest plains, ends up draining into the oceans. And although this has happened for countless millions of years, the growing ecological footprint of our species in the last century has affected the cycle in profound ways. From fertilizer overuse in landlocked areas, which creates life-choking algal blooms thousand of miles away, to everyday plastic items washing up in even the most remote areas of the globe, our actions affect the health of this, our sole life-support system. This statement is not here to make us feel that we are doomed by our actions, but rather to illustrate that through improved knowledge of the ocean system and its inhabitants, we can become impassioned to work toward curing our planet’s faltering health. By taking simple steps, such as paying a little more attention to our daily routines, each one of us can have a significant positive impact on the future of our planet and on the world our children will inherit. In short, it would be much healthier for us to learn to dance nature’s waltz than to try to change the music.
MOVING EN MASSE
The fast, coordinated movement of a shoal of fish is one of the most spectacular sights in the oceans. These blackfin barracuda have formed a spiraling shoal in water around the Solomon Islands. Such shoals are often found in the same place several months, or even years, apart.
Fabien Cousteau
ICE AND SEA
An albatross is seen here against the backdrop of a huge iceberg near South Georgia in the south Atlantic. All icebergs in Southern Hemisphere waters were once part of the vast Antarctic Ice Sheet, having entered the sea after breaking away from one of the ice shelves that extend from land out into the Southern Ocean.
OCEAN PARTNERSHIP
Relationships between animals in the oceans are often intricate. This anemone shrimp is using its long limbs and antennae to crawl over an anemone, removing waste and pieces of food. The shrimp is the chief beneficiary of this relationship, as the anemone not only provides food but also protects it from predators.
NORTHERN EXPOSURE
The world’s shorelines can be inhospitable places to live. Common murres nest in colonies, favoring rocky cliffs. These birds are clinging to a rock off the Scottish coast, while being battered by a fierce gale. During the storm, many of the birds were swept off the rock and some of their eggs were washed into the sea. PROTECTION OF THE YOUNG
The packhorse lobster inhabits the continental shelves off Australia and New Zealand. The female shown here is carrying eggs under her abdomen. Up to two million eggs at a time can be stored in this way. Despite producing eggs in such prodigious numbers, these lobsters are threatened by overfishing and catches are now restricted.
CORAL REFUGE
The spiny-headed blenny is a common but inconspicuous inhabitant of reefs in the Caribbean Sea. Just ¾ in (2 cm) long, it is often found in holes that were originally made by worms or mollusks but have since been abandoned. This one is surrounded by star coral polyps and, like the corals, is feeding on plankton.
FILTER-FEEDING WITH FEATHERS
Instead of moving around in search of food, many marine animals spend their lives fixed to the sea bed, collecting food as it drifts past. These featherlike funnels are actually part of the body of a worm. The worm beats tiny, hairlike structures to set up a current through the funnels and then traps food from the moving water.
NEW COASTLINE
The shape of a coastline is determined by a balance of forces. The coastlines of the Galápagos Islands in the eastern Pacific are relatively new, having formed when the islands were created by volcanic eruptions. The lava seen here solidified about 100 years ago, but more recent eruptions have occurred on some of the group’s younger islands. THE FALL OF THE APOSTLES
On this part of the southern Australian coast, marine erosion is the dominant force. A line of limestone cliffs is slowly being worn back by the sea, leaving behind isolated stacks of rock. The stacks are collectively known as the Twelve Apostles, although when they were named there were only nine of them and there are now just eight.
LIVING ON THE BOTTOM
The flattened body of a ray is an adaptation for life on the bottom of the sea. Most rays feed on animals on the seabed, and so their mouths are on the undersides of their bodies. They have flat teeth, which they use to grasp and then grind food. The features that resemble eyes are actually the ray’s nostrils.
AVOIDING A STING
Clownfish have a remarkable relationship with some anemones, feeding and sleeping among them. The anemones’ stinging tentacles repel all other fish, but the clownfish avoid triggering the firing of the anemones’ stinging cells with an undulating swimming action and by secreting chemicals that suppress the firing process. LEARNING TO SWIM
Being able to swim is a useful skill for polar bears, which for part of the year track their prey across shifting sea ice in the Arctic Ocean and are sometimes seen in the water many miles from land. While underwater, they keep their eyes open but close their nostrils. They can remain submerged for up to two minutes.
ACROBATS OF THE OCEANS
The common dolphin is one of the oceans’ most abundant cetaceans, a group of mammals that includes not only dolphins but also whales and porpoises. Common dolphins are sociable animals, sometimes gathering in noisy groups of thousands of individuals. The fast-moving shoal seen here is feeding on sardines in False Bay off South Africa.
INTRODUCTION
EARTH’S OCEANS CONTAIN about
324 million cubic miles (1.36 billion cubic kilometers) of seawater. Dissolved in this are some 53 million billion tons (48 million billion metric tons) of salts, gases, and other substances. The base substance, water itself, has many unusual properties, such as its high surface tension and heat capacity, which are of tremendous significance to everything from the oceans’ ability to support life to their stabilizing effect on the world’s climate, and their ability to transmit waves. Also of significance is the variability of ocean water—the sea is not uniform but varies spatially and sometimes seasonally in attributes such as its temperature, pressure, dissolved-oxygen content, and level and quality of light illumination. These attributes are important in numerous key respects.
O C E A N WATE R CRASHING WAVE
This “barrel” wave is crashing onto the north shore of the island of Oahu, Hawaii. Inspiring sights such as this are only possible because of some of the unusual properties of water.
ocean water
32
hydrogen atom consists of one proton and one electron
THE PROPERTIES OF WATER
hydrogen nucleus, consisting of single proton, contains positive charge
THE MAIN CONSTITUENT OF THE OCEANS IS, of
course, water. The presence of large amounts of liquid water on Earth’s surface over much of its history has resulted from a fortunate combination of factors. Among them are water’s unusually high freezing and boiling points for a molecule of its size, and its relative chemical stability. Water also has other remarkable properties that contribute to the characteristics of oceans—from their + + ability to support life to effects on climate. Underlying these properties is water’s molecular structure. water molecule
–
THE WATER MOLECULE
hydrogen bond
+
region of slight negative charge
+ –
– +
+ region of slight positive charge
–
+
shared electron
one of eight electrons in oxygen atom oxygen
atom free A molecule of water (H2O) consists of two hydrogen (H) electron atoms bound to one atom of oxygen (O). Crucial to formation of the bonds between the oxygen and hydrogen atoms are four tiny negatively charged particles called electrons, which are shared between the atoms. In addition, six other electrons move around HYDROGEN BONDS within different regions of the oxygen atom. This A hydrogen bond is an electron arrangement makes the H2O molecule attractive electrostatic force chemically stable but gives it an unusual shape. It also between regions of slight produces a small imbalance in the distribution of positive and negative charge on neighboring water electrical charge within the molecule. An important molecules. Several bonds result of this is that neighboring water molecules are are visible here. drawn to each other by forces called hydrogen bonds.
oxygen nucleus, containing protons and neutrons, has positive charge
CHARGE IMBALANCE
The distribution of negative charges (electrons) and regions of positive charge in an H2O molecule causes one side to carry a slight positive charge and the other side a slight negative charge.
water molecule at surface
WALKING ON WATER
INTRODUCTION
Certain insects, such as sea skaters and water striders (pictured below), exploit surface tension to walk, feed, and mate on the surface of the sea, lakes, or ponds.
SURFACE TENSION
hydrogen bonds
One special property of liquid water that can be directly attributed to the attractive forces between its molecules is its high surface tension. In any aggregation of water molecules, the surface molecules tend to be drawn together and inward toward the center of the aggregation, water forming a surface “skin” that is resistant to disruption. Surface molecule tension can be thought of as the force that has to be exerted or below countered to break through this skin. Water’s high surface tension surface has various important effects. Perhaps the most crucial is that it is vital to certain processes within living organisms—for example, water transport in plants and blood transport in animals. Surface tension also allows small insects such as sea skaters to walk and feed on the ocean surface, and it even plays a part in the formation of ocean waves (see p.76).
CAUSE OF SURFACE TENSION
In a drop of water, molecules are pulled in all directions by hydrogen bonding with their neighbors. But at the surface, the only forces act inward, or sideways, toward other surface molecules.
WATER DROPLETS
The shape of these droplets results from surface tension. The forces pulling their surface molecules together are stronger than the gravitational forces flattening them.
ocean water
34
THE CHEMISTRY OF SEAWATER volcanic ash drifts down to sea
THE OCEANS CONTAIN MILLIONS OF DISSOLVED chemical substances. Most of these are present in exceedingly small concentrations. Those present in significant concentrations include sea salt, which is not a single substance but a mixture of charged particles called ions. Other constituents include gases such as oxygen and carbon dioxide. One reason the oceans contain so many dissolved substances is that water is an excellent solvent.
THE SALTY SEA
salts are leached from rocks into rivers and streams and flow to ocean
The salt in the oceans exists in the form of charged particles, called ions, some positively charged and some negatively charged. The most common of these are sodium and chloride ions, the components of ordinary table salt (sodium chloride). Together they make up about 85 percent by mass of all the salt in the sea. Nearly all the rest is made up of the next four most common ions, which are sulfate, magnesium, calcium, and potassium. All these ions, together with several others present in smaller quantities, exist throughout the oceans in fixed proportions. Each is distributed extremely uniformly—this is in contrast to some other dissolved substances in seawater, which are unevenly distributed.
salt spray onto land
nutrients from soil wash into rivers and streams, and flow to ocean
BREAKDOWN OF SALT
If 2½ gallons (10 liters) of seawater are evaporated, about 123/4 oz (353 g) of salts are obtained, of the types shown below. 2½ gallons (10 liters) of seawater
other salts 1/3 oz (8.9 g) gypsum ½ oz (15.4 g) +
magnesium salts 2 oz (56 g) sodium chloride (halite) 10 oz (273 g)
+
+ – –
+
– Na+
–
–
– –
+
WATER AS A SOLVENT
+
slow uplift of sedimentary rocks at continental margins, exposing salts, minerals, and ions at surface
–
sodium chloride crystal
+ –
+
+ Cl–
+
water molecule
+
!,%8!.$%2-!2#%4 4HE3WISSCHEMISTANDDOCTOR!LEXANDER -ARCET¨ CARRIEDOUTSOMEOFTHE EARLIESTRESEARCHINMARINECHEMISTRY(EIS BESTKNOWNFORHISDISCOVERY IN THAT ALLTHEMAINCHEMICALIONSINSEAWATERSUCH ASSODIUM CHLORIDE ANDMAGNESIUMIONS AREPRESENTINEXACTLYTHESAMEPROPORTIONS THROUGHOUTTHEWORLDSOCEANS4HE UNCHANGINGRATIOBETWEENTHEIONSHOLDS TRUEREGARDLESSOFANYVARIATIONSINTHE SALINITYOFWATERANDISKNOWN TODAYASTHEPRINCIPLEOF CONSTANTPROPORTIONS
nutrient upwelling
SOURCES AND SINKS
+ –
+ + –
–
PEOPLE
uptake of nutrients by phytoplankton
–
–
chloride ion (negative charge)
INTRODUCTION
+
–
+
The charge imbalance on its molecules makes water a good solvent. When dissolving and holding sodium chloride in solution, the positive ends of the molecules face the chloride ions and the negative ends face the sodium ions.
sodium ion (positive charge)
–
exchange of gases between phytoplankton and seawater
sinking and
decomposition The ions that make up the salt in the oceans have arrived of dead there through various processes. Some were dissolved out of organisms rocks on land by the action of rainwater and carried to the sea in rivers. Others entered the sea in the emanations of hydrothermal vents (see p.188), in dust blown off the land, or came from volcanic ash. There are also “sinks” for every type of ion—processes that remove them from seawater. These range from salt spray onto land to the precipitation of various ions onto the seafloor as mineral deposits. Each type of ion has a characteristic residence time. This is the time that an ion remains in seawater before it is removed. The common ions in seawater have long residence times, ranging from a few hundred years to hundreds of millions of years.
RIVER DISCHARGE
River discharge is a mechanism by which ions of sea salt and nutrients enter the oceans. Here, the Noosa River empties into the sea on the coast of Queensland, Australia.
the chemistry of seawater SOURCES, SINKS, AND EXCHANGES
spread of volcanic ash and gases into rain clouds
Shown here are various sources, sinks, and exchange processes for the ions, salts, and minerals (yellow arrows), gases (pink arrows), and plant nutrients (turquoise arrows) in seawater.
KEY
35
GASES IN SEAWATER gases ions, salts, and minerals plant nutrients
The main gases dissolved in seawater are nitrogen (N), oxygen (O2), and carbon dioxide (CO2). The levels of O2 and CO2 vary in response to the activities of photosynthesizing organisms (phytoplankton) and animals. The level of O2 is generally highest near the surface, where the gas is absorbed from the air and also produced by photosynthesizers. Its concentration drops to a minimum at about 3,300 ft (1,000 m), where oxygen is consumed by bacterial oxidation of dead organic matter and by animals feeding on this matter. Deeper down, the O2 level increases again. CO2 levels are highest at depth and lowest at the surface, where the gas is taken up by photosynthesizers faster than it is produced by respiration. CARBON SINK
washing of ions from volcanic dust and gases into sea, dissolved in rain
Many marine animals, such as nautiluses (below), use carbonate (a compound of carbon and oxygen) in seawater to make their shells. After they die, the shells may form sediments and eventually rocks.
dust blown off land
exchange of gases between animals and seawater
exchange of gases between ocean and atmosphere
OXYGEN PRODUCER AND CONSUMER
Oxygen levels in the upper ocean depend on the balance between its production by photosynthesizing organisms, such as kelp, and its consumption by animals, such as fish.
NUTRIENTS
release of minerals from hydrothermal vents dissolving of minerals from sea floor precipitation of minerals onto sea floor
SILICEOUS DIATOMS
These tiny forms of planktonic organisms have cell walls made of silicate. They can only grow if there are sufficient amounts of silica present in the water.
PLANKTON BLOOM
This satellite image of the Skagerrak (a strait linking the North and Baltic seas) shows a bloom of phytoplankton, visible as a turquoise discoloration in the water.
INTRODUCTION
carbonates incorporated into seafloor sediments from animal shells
Numerous substances present in small amounts in seawater are essential for marine organisms to grow. At the base of the oceanic food chain are phytoplankton—microscopic floating life-forms that obtain energy by photosynthesis. Phytoplankton need substances such as nitrates, iron, and phosphates in order to grow and multiply. If the supply of these nutrients dries up, their growth stops; conversely, blooms (rapid growth phases) occur if it increases. Although the sea receives some input of nutrients from sources such as rivers, the main supply comes from a continuous cycle within the ocean. As organisms die, they sink to the ocean floor, where their tissues decompose and release nutrients. Upwelling of seawater from the ocean floor (see p.60) recharges the surface waters with vital substances, where they are taken up by the phytoplankton, refueling the chain.
ocean water
36
TEMPERATURE AND SALINITY OCEAN WATER IS NOT UNIFORM BUT VARIES in several physical attributes, including temperature, salinity, pressure, and density. These vary vertically (dividing the oceans into layers), horizontally (between tropical and temperate regions, for example), and seasonally. The basic variables, temperature and salinity, in turn produce variations in density that help drive deep-water ocean circulation.
MARCH 2003
TEMPERATURE
PACIFIC VARIATION
Temperature varies considerably over the upper areas of the oceans. In the tropics and subtropics, solar heating keeps the ocean surface warm throughout the year. Below the surface, the temperature declines steeply to about 46–50˚F (8–10˚C) at a depth of 3,300 ft (1,000 m). This region of steep decline is called a thermocline. Deeper still, temperature decreases more gradually to a uniform, near-freezing value of about 36˚F (2˚C) on the sea floor—this temperature subsists throughout the deep oceans. In mid-latitudes there is a much more marked seasonal variation in surface temperature. In high latitudes and polar oceans, the water is constantly cold, sometimes below 32˚F (0˚C).
MARCH 2001
The Pacific experiences long-term fluctuations (called El Niño Southern Oscillation) in the temperature patterns in its surface waters. These images contrast the patterns in March in two different years— red and white indicate warmer water, green and blue cooler water.
cool surface waters caused by cold current moving up coast
OCEAN SURFACE TEMPERATURE
INTRODUCTION
This map shows average surface temperatures in March. Proximity to the equator is the main factor determining surface temperature, but ocean currents also play a role.
warm tropical water, with temperatures constantly above 77˚F (25˚C) region of variable surface temperature, fluctuating seasonally from 45 to 68˚F (7–20˚C)
constantly cold water with temperatures in the range of 32– 37˚F (0–3˚C)
North America
warm surface waters caused by warm current moving down southeast coast
constantly cold water off Greenland
constantly warm pool of water in Caribbean Sea
thermocline, where temperature declines rapidly with depth
South America
TEMPERATURE AND DEPTH
cold bottom water at a uniform temperature of 36˚F (2˚C)
Shown in early summer, the vast bulk of ocean water in this part of the north Atlantic is uniformly cold (below 41˚F/5˚C). Only a thin surface layer from the tropics into midlatitudes is warmed above this base level.
KEY
90°F
32°C 30°C
70°F
20°C
50°F
10°C
30°F
0°C
37
SALINITY
PRESSURE
Salinity is an expression of the amount of salt in a fixed mass of seawater. It is determined by measuring a seawater sample’s electrical conductivity and averages about ½ oz of salt per pound (35 grams per kilogram) of seawater. Salinity varies considerably over the surface of oceans—its value at any particular spot depends on what processes or factors are operating at that location that either add or remove water. Factors that add water, causing low salinity, include high rainfall, river input, or melting of sea ice. Processes that remove water, causing high salinity, include high evaporative losses and sea-ice formation. At depth, salinity is near constant throughout the oceans. Between the surface and deep water is a region called a halocline, where salinity gradually increases or decreases with depth. Salinity affects the freezing point of seawater— the higher the salinity, the lower the freezing point.
Scientists measure pressure in units called bars. At sea level, the weight of the atmosphere exerts a pressure of about one bar. Underwater, pressure increases by one bar for every 33-ft (10-m) increase in depth, due to the weight of the overlying water.This means that at 230 ft (70 m), for example, the total pressure is eight bars or eight atmospheres (eight times the surface pressure).This pressure increase poses a challenge to human exploration of the oceans.To inflate their lungs underwater, divers have to breathe pressurized air or other gas mixtures, but doing DECOMPRESSION STOP so can cause additional To avoid a condition called “bends” that can arise from problems (arising from the dissolution of excess decompressing too quickly, on their way to the surface gas in body tissues). scuba divers sometimes These problems limit have to make timed stops the depths attainable. to release excess gas.
NATURAL ADAPTATION
Elephant seals can dive to depths of up to 2,000 ft (600 m). They have evolved various adaptations for coping with the high pressure, including collapsible rib cages.
KEY
EASY FLOATING
GLOBAL SALINITY
In some enclosed seas where evaporative losses are high and there is little rainfall or river inflow, the seawater can become so saline and dense that floating becomes easy. This is the case here in the Dead Sea.
Surface salinity is highest in the subtropics, where evaporative losses of water are high, or in enclosed or semi-enclosed basins (such as the Mediterranean). It is lowest in colder regions or where there are large inflows of river water.
37 36 35 34 33 32 31 30 29 under 29 parts per thousand (‰)
DENSITY
$%#/-02%33)/. !FTERWORKINGUNDERWATERFOR HOURSATATIME PROFESSIONAL DIVERSROUTINELYUNDERGO CONTROLLEDDECOMPRESSIONIN ASPECIALPRESSURECHAMBER 4HESEFACILITIESAREALSOUSED TOTREATPRESSURE RELATEDDIVING ILLNESSESANDFORRESEARCHINTO DIVINGPHYSIOLOGY PRESSURE CHAMBER
The person being decompressed may have to breathe a special gas mixture while the ambient pressure is slowly reduced.
warm surface flow
Atlantic Central Water: warm, low-density surface waters in the tropics and subtropics
Atlantic Intermediate Water: cool layer of intermediate density, forms and sinks in north Atlantic, then moves south
DENSITY LAYERS IN ATLANTIC
The oceans each contain distinct, named water masses that increase in density from the surface downward. The denser, cooler masses sink and move slowly toward the equator. The cold, high-density deep and bottom waters comprise 80 percent of the total volume of the ocean.
Antarctic Bottom Water: coldest and densest layer, forms close to Antarctica, sinks then moves north
mid-ocean ridge
North Atlantic Deep Water: cold, dense water, forms and sinks in north Atlantic, then moves south
INTRODUCTION
The density of any small portion of seawater depends primarily on its temperature and salinity. Any decrease in temperature or increase in salinity makes seawater denser—an exception being a temperature drop below 39˚F (4˚C), which actually makes it a little less dense. In any part of the ocean, the density of the water increases with depth, because dense water always sinks if there is less dense water below it. Processes that change the density of seawater cause it to either rise or sink, and drive large-scale circulation in the oceans between the surface and deep water (see p.60). Most important is water carried toward Antarctica and the Arctic Ocean Antarctic Intermediate fringes. This becomes denser as it Water: cool layer intermediate cools and through an increase in of density, sinks and its salinity as a result of sea-ice moves north formation. In these regions, large quantities of cold, dense, salty water continually form and sink toward the ocean floor.
DISCOVERY
ocean water
38
LIGHT AND SOUND
DEPTH
Violet
Blue
Green
400 nm
510 nm
200 ft
570 nm
(30 m)
LIGHT IN THE OCEAN 590 nm
650 nm
100 ft
Yellow
Orange
Red
LIGHT AND SOUND BEHAVE VERY DIFFERENTLY in water than in air. Most light wavelengths are quickly absorbed by water, a fact that both explains why the sea is blue and why ocean life is concentrated near its surface— almost the entire marine food chain relies on light energy driving plant growth. Sound, in contrast, travels better in water, a fact exploited by animals such as dolphins.
(60 m)
475 nm
300 ft (90 m)
LIGHT PENETRATION
The red and orange components of sunlight are absorbed in the top 50 ft (15 m) of the ocean. Most other colors are absorbed in the next 130 ft (40 m). Wavelength is measured in nanometers (nm).
White light, such as sunlight, contains a mixture of light wavelengths, ranging from long (red) to short (violet). Ocean water strongly absorbs red, orange, and yellow light, so only some blue and a little green and violet light reach beyond a depth of about 130 ft (40 m). At 300 ft (90 m), most of even the blue light (the most penetrating) has been absorbed, while below 650 ft (200 m), the only light comes from bioluminescent organisms, which produce their own light (see p.224). Because they rely on light to photosynthesize, phytoplankton are restricted to the upper layers of the ocean, and this in turn affects the distribution of other marine organisms. Intriguingly, many bright red animals live at depths that are devoid of red light: their color provides camouflage, since they appear black.
COLOR RESTORATION
At a depth of 65 ft (20 m), most animals and plants look blue-green under ambient light conditions (top). Lighting up the scene with a photographic flash or flashlight reveals the true colors (bottom).
INTRODUCTION
&)3(6)3)/.
FIREFLY SQUID
This squid produces a pattern of glowing spots (photophores). When viewed by a predator swimming below, the spots help camouflage its outline against the moonlit waters above.
&ISHHAVEEXCELLENTVISION WHICHHELPS THEMFINDFOODANDAVOIDPREDATORS -ANYCANSEEINCOLOR4HELENS OFAFISHSEYEISALMOSTSPHERICAL ANDMADEOFAMATERIALWITHA HIGHREFRACTIVEINDEX)TCANBE MOVEDBACKWARDANDFORWARD TOFOCUSLIGHTONTHERETINA FISH EYE
The lens of a fish’s eye bulges through the iris (the dark central part) almost touching the cornea (outer part). This helps to gather the maximum amount of light and gives a wide field of view.
light and sound
Seen from underwater, only a part of the surface of the sea appears lit up, while the rest looks dark. This is an effect of the way light waves are bent (refracted) when they enter the sea from the air.
SEA COLORS Seawater has no intrinsic color—a glass of seawater is transparent. But on a clear, sunny day, the sea usually looks blue or turquoise. In part, this is due to the sea surface reflecting the sky, but the main reason is that most of the light coming off the surface has already penetrated it and been reflected back by particles in the water or by the sea bed. During its journey through the water, most of the light is absorbed, except for some blue and green light, which are the colors seen. Other factors can modify the sea’s color. In windy weather, the surface becomes flecked with white, caused by trapped bubbles of air, which reflect most of the light that hits them. Rain interferes with seawater’s light-transmitting properties, so rainy, overcast weather generally produces dark, gray-green seas. Occasionally, living organisms, such as “blooms” of plankton, can turn patches of the sea vivid colors.
VIVID GREEN FROM ALGAL BLOOM
TROPICAL TURQUOISE
OCEAN SHADES
A green sea (top) is sometimes caused by the presence of algae. Turquoise is the usual shade in clear tropical waters, while gray water flecked with white foam is typical of windy, overcast days.
GRAY FOAMY TEMPERATE SEA
PEOPLE
UNDERWATER SOUNDS
7!,4%2-5.+
The oceans are noisier than might be imagined. Sources of sound include ships, submarines, earthquakes, underwater landslides, and the sounds of icebergs breaking off glaciers and ice shelves. In addition, by transmitting sound waves or bouncing them off underwater objects (echolocation) whales and dolphins use sound for navigation, hunting, and communication. Sound waves travel faster and farther underwater than they do in air. Their speed underwater is about 5,000 ft (1,500 m) per second and is increased by a rise in the pressure (depth) of the water and decreased by a drop in temperature. Combining these two effects, in most ocean regions, there is a layer of minimum sound velocity at a depth of about 3,300 ft (1,000 m). This layer is called the SOFAR (Sound Fixing and Ranging) channel. The properties of the SOFAR channel are exploited by people using underwater listening devices and, it has been theorized, by animals such as whales and dolphins.
4HE!USTRIAN !MERICANSCIENTIST 7ALTER-UNKB PIONEERED THEUSEOFSOUNDWAVESIN OCEANOGRAPHY!PROFESSORATTHE 3CRIPPS)NSTITUTEOF/CEANOGRAPHY IN3AN$IEGO #ALIFORNIA -UNK DEMONSTRATEDTHATBYSTUDYING THEPATTERNSANDSPEEDOFSOUND PROPAGATIONUNDERWATER INFORMATIONCAN BEOBTAINED ABOUTTHE LARGE SCALE STRUCTURE OFOCEAN BASINS
HUMPBACK WHALE SONG
The peaks and troughs in this spectrogram show the changes in frequency of a few seconds of repeated sound made by a humpback whale. THE SOFAR CHANNEL
sound travels slower within channel
3,300 ft
SOFAR channel
(1,000 m) 6,600 ft (2,000 m) 9,800 ft (3,000 m) 4,900 ft/s 5,000 ft/s 5,086 ft/s (1,500 m/s) (1,525 m/s) (1,550 m/s)
SPEED OF SOUND UNDERWATER
Low-frequency sounds generated in the SOFAR channel are “trapped” in it by inward refraction from the edges of the channel. As a result, sounds can travel very long distances in this ocean layer.
INTRODUCTION
Sea level
DEPTH
LOOKING UP
39
OCEANS ARE ALMOST as old as Earth
itself. Sediments were accumulating underwater at least 500 million years before the formation of the oldest rocks known today. And yet the ocean floor is very young. Discovery of the processes that create and rapidly recycle the ocean floor led to our modern understanding of plate tectonics. These processes give Earth a surface quite unlike those of our planetary neighbors, with deep ocean basins and high-standing continents. The positions of the oceans and continents are not fixed, but driven by heat flow deep within the planet. An understanding of ocean geology opens a window on Earth’s interior, as well as providing insights into the global climate and the evolution of life on Earth.
OC E A N G E OLOGY OCEANIC LAVA
Steam mixes with surf as lava from Kilauea Crater reaches the Pacific Ocean on the south shore of Hawaii. Basaltic lava such as this makes up the oceanic part of Earth’s crust.
ocean geology
42
THE FORMATION OF EARTH EARTH STARTED TO FORM MORE THAN 4.5 billion years ago in a disk of gas, dust, and ice around the early Sun. This protoplanetary disk, as it is known, was held in orbit by the gravitational field of the young star. Gravitational attraction between dust particles in the disk produced small rocks, and collisions concentrated the rocks into several rings. The most densely populated rings went on to form the planets of the solar system.
EARLY SOLAR SYSTEM
BIRTH OF EARTH
The early solar system contained a disk of dust, ice, and gas, from which the rocky inner planets and gaseous outer planets formed.
small pieces of rock and ice pulled together by gravitational attraction
planetesimals start to form in protoplanetary disk around Sun
Initially, the rocks within each ring drifted together, due to their mutual gravitational attraction, in a process known as cold accretion. The largest bodies in each ring attracted the most material and grew to form small planetary bodies, or planetesimals, one of which was the early Earth. Planetesimals are loose collections of rock and ice, with a uniform structure. As the mass of a planetesimal grows larger, it exerts a stronger gravitational pull, becoming more tightly held together and attracting nearby rocks with greater force. Collisions between planetesimals broke them apart or grouped them together. In the inner solar system, the planetesimals in each orbiting ring came together to form the rocky planets. Earth was born in this way about 4,560 million years ago.
1 COLD ACCRETION
Under gravity, pieces of rock and ice coalesced. Material sharing the same orbit around the Sun clumped together.
3 HEAVY BOMBARDMENT
Smaller rocks were pulled toward growing planetesimals with increasing force, producing more energetic high-speed impacts. This bombardment continued until most of the material in the vicinity of Earth’s orbit was consumed.
2 PLANETESIMAL
Large concentrations of rock and ice formed planetesimals. Their gravity fields became stronger as their mass increased, smoothing out their irregular surfaces.
impact of Mars-sized body leads to total melting
rocks accelerate toward primordial Earth
impacts generate surface heat and local melting
INTERNAL HEAT The early Earth was mostly cold, mostly solid, and had a fairly uniform interior composition. Today it has a hot interior, part of it liquid, with well-defined zones of different composition. This transition may have its roots in several different energy sources. Localized surface melting would have occurred when the kinetic energy of incoming rocks was converted to heat during impacts. More significant heat sources would have been the decay of radioactive elements in the interior rocks and the heat released by Earth’s contraction under the force of its own gravity—a process that led to an event called the iron catastrophe (see below). Impact with a sufficiently large body might have released enough heat to melt Earth’s interior, and this may have happened more than once.
MOON FORMATION
Early in its history, Earth was struck by a large planetesimal, creating the Moon, tilting Earth’s axis of rotation, and leaving it with a slightly eccentric orbit.
INTRODUCTION
THE IRON CATASTROPHE
material ejected during collision later cooled and coalesced to form the Moon
As Earth grew larger, the strength of its gravitational field increased, which in turn attracted more material.
1
Eventually, the gravitational field was strong enough to cause Earth to contract, converting gravitational potential energy into heat.
2
Enough heat was released to melt the iron contained in Earth’s rocks, allowing it to flow down to the center of Earth.
3
The sinking of large amounts of iron released further heat, enough to melt the entire interior of the planet in the event called the iron catastrophe.
4
the formation of Earth
CONVECTION AND DIFFERENTIATION After the interior of Earth melted, its heaviest constituents were able to sink to the center and the lighter ones to rise toward the surface. One-third of the planet’s mass pooled at the center and formed a dense core consisting mainly of iron, the heaviest of the common elements making up Earth. The core became the hottest part of the planet, up to 8,500˚F (4,700˚C), and a source of heat for the molten rocks above. Most materials expand as they are heated, becoming less dense and more buoyant. This is the basis of convection, which provided a mechanism for carrying heat and material from the interior of Earth toward the surface.Vigorous convection cells carried hot, buoyant material upward, where it lost heat by conduction near the surface before sinking again. Lighter materials such as aluminum were left behind at the surface, forming a thin crust. In this way, Earth became differentiated into layers of different chemical composition: a metallic core, a rocky mantle, and a buoyant crust. This occurred as early as 4,500 million years ago.
A LAYERED EARTH
Early Earth had a uniform composition, but melting allowed chemical “zoning” to develop.
convection carries internal heat to surface lighter materials rise up through semi-fluid mantle
heavy materials sink to form dense core
-!.4,%3!-0,% /URKNOWLEDGEOF%ARTHS INTERIORISBASEDONINDIRECT METHODS SUCHASSTUDYINGSEISMIC SIGNALSORGRAVITYVARIATIONS7HILE MANTLEROCKSCANBEFOUNDONTHE SURFACE THEYHAVEBEENALTEREDBY HEATINGANDOTHERPROCESSES SO SCIENTISTSARENOWTRYINGTODIRECTLY MEASURECONDITIONSINTHEMANTLE ASPARTOFTHE)NTEGRATED/CEAN $RILLING0ROGRAM
nitrogen
ATMOSPHERE AND OCEAN
Earth’s interior is now split into three chemically distinct layers, which can be further split by changes in their physical properties due to temperature and pressure variations with depth. The core consists of an iron-nickel alloy, with some impurities, at a temperature of 6,300–8,500˚F (3,500–4,700˚C). Iron in the inner part of the core has solidified under the immense pressure, but the outer part is still a free-flowing liquid. The mantle of silicate rock surrounding the core has also solidified, but a form of convection called “solid-state creep” still takes place, with material in the lower mantle moving a few inches per year. The upper mantle, within about 215 miles (350 km) of the surface, is a more easily deformed lower mantle “plastic” region. Above it floats a thin crust enriched in lighter elements, with average thickness ranging from 5 miles (8 km) beneath the oceans to 28 miles (45 km) under the continents.
Although hot enough to melt surface rocks, Earth’s mantle is kept solid by the high pressure of overlying rock. Melting only occurs in discrete locations where extremely hot parts of the mantle are decompressed.
DISCOVERY
water vapor
EARTH TODAY
EARTH’S INTERNAL STRUCTURE
carbon dioxide
43
The lightest materials of all, gases and water, were expelled from the interior to form the outer atmospheric and ocean layers at an early stage in Earth’s history.
THE DEEPEST HOLE
The Japanese research ship Chikyu (“Earth”) is designed to drill through 4.35 miles (7,000 m) of ocean crust, in seas up to 1.5 miles (2,500 m) deep, to retrieve rock cores from the mantle.
crust of silicate minerals, rich in aluminum
upper mantle
inner core of solid iron-nickel
outer core of liquid iron-nickel
mantle of silicate minerals, rich in magnesium
thin, dense oceanic crust
INTRODUCTION
thick, light continental crust
ocean geology
44
THE ORIGIN OF OCEANS AND CONTINENTS 4 billion years ago, mainly from water vapor that condensed from its primitive atmosphere but also from water brought from space by comets. Once its materials had been softened by density into vertical layers, Earth had a uniform crust that was enriched in lighter elements and floated on an upper mantle made of denser materials. Later, a horizontal differentiation also developed as continents began to form, made from rocks that were chemically distinct from those underlying the oceans. EARTH’S OCEANS FORMED MORE THAN
zircon crystals, among the earliest continental crust materials ZIRCON primitive continental crust thickens above sinking mantle flow, without mantle interference
CONTINENTAL CRUST The continents include a wide range of rock types, THE OLDEST ROCKS including granitic igneous rocks, sedimentary rocks, These sedimentary rocks on Baffin Island and the metamorphic rocks formed by the lie on the Canadian alteration of both. They contain a lot of quartz, a Shield. The stable mineral absent in oceanic crust. The first continental continental shields rocks were the result of repeated melting, cooling, contain the world’s oldest rocks, granites and remixing of oceanic crust, driven by volcanic activity above mantle convection cells, which were dating back to 3.8 billion years. much more numerous and vigorous than today’s. Each cycle left more of the heavier components in the upper mantle and concentrated more of the lighter components in the crust. The first microcontinents grew as lighter fragments of crust collided and fused. Thickening of the crust led to melting at its base and underplating with granitic igneous rocks. Weathering accelerated the process of continental rock formation, retaining the most resistant components, such as quartz, while washing solubles into the ocean. basaltic lava
rift
basalt sheets (dikes) sediment ocean surface
ocean crust
gabbro peridotite
lithosphere
Moho asthenosphere
magma rises to surface
upper mantle
INTRODUCTION
OCEAN-FLOOR STRUCTURE
Three layers of basalt in the crust (basaltic lava, dikes, and gabbro) are separated from the mantle by the Mohorovicic discontinuity (the Moho). The upper mantle is fused to the base of the crust to form the rigid lithosphere. The asthenosphere is the soft zone over which the plates of the lithosphere glide. MANTLE ROCKS
Peridotite is the dominant rock type found in the mantle, consisting of silicates of magnesium, iron, and other metals. Sometimes it is brought to the surface when parts of the ocean floor are uplifted, as here in Newfoundland, Canada, or as fragments from volcanic activity.
sedimentary rocks
primitive oceanic crust
volcanic activity adds igneous rocks to surface above rising flows
OCEANIC CRUST The oceanic crust has a higher density than the continental crust, making it less buoyant. Both types of crust can be thought of as floating on the “plastic” upper mantle, and the oceanic crust lies lower due to its lower buoyancy. It is relatively thin, with a depth no more than 7 miles (11 km), compared with 15–43 miles (25–70 km) beneath the continents. It consists mainly of basalt, an igneous rock that is low in silica compared with continental rocks, and richer in calcium than the mantle. Basalt lava is created when hot material in the upper mantle is decompressed, allowing it to melt and form liquid magma. The decompression occurs beneath rifts in the crust, such as those found at the mid-ocean ridges, and it is through these rifts that lava is extruded onto the surface to create new ocean crust.
the origin of oceans and continents DEVELOPMENT OF CONTINENTAL CRUST
Modification of the crust above rising mantle flows was delayed by the continuous intrusion of mantle basalt, resulting in the greenstone belts found today at the heart of each continental shield. greenstone belts above rising mantle flow basalt continuously intrudes from mantle
crust pulled apart by convective motion in mantle
45
BANDED IRON
WATER AND ATMOSPHERE
Known as a banded-iron formation, this layered rock contains iron oxides that formed as the oxygen content of early oceans increased.
During the process of differentiation, volatile materials were expelled from Earth’s interior by volcanic activity. The lightest gases, such as hydrogen and helium, would quickly have been lost to space, leaving a stable atmosphere of nitrogen, carbon dioxide, and water vapor. Some of the water vapor would have condensed to form liquid water, and it seems there was a significant ocean water from ocean earlier than 4 billion years ago. volcanic eruptions and comet Some meteorites contain 15-20 percent impacts water and the early Earth is thought to have had the same composition, providing an ample source for the early ocean. More water arrived with impacting comets. It was in the ocean that free oxygen traces of early meteorite and first appeared, with the comet bombardment arrival of photogradually erased synthesizing life around 3.5 billion years ago.
rivers erode and transport sediment
THE EARLY EARTH mantle vigorous convection cells in upper mantle
Earth had deep oceans from an early stage, with volcanoes and an increasing area of continental crust standing above the surface. The ocean became salty as weathering of surface rocks added minerals to the water.
rifts occur when fragments of crust move apart
volcanic eruptions add gases and water vapor to atmosphere
liquid outer core
solid inner core
This radar image shows volcanoes formed from andesite lava, whose composition is intermediate between oceanic and continental rocks.
INTRODUCTION
ANDEAN VOLCANOES
ocean geology
46
THE EVOLUTION OF THE OCEANS spreading ridge
EVER SINCE THE ATLANTIC COASTS OF SOUTH AMERICA and Africa were accurately charted, it has been apparent that they match like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. We now know that the continents move, that they were once joined together, and that today’s oceans arose when the landmasses split apart. The evolving oceans have modified the global climate, and sea level has fluctuated in response to climate change and geological factors.
continent carried on plates
1. CAMBRIAN (500 MYA)
PLATE TECTONICS
The remains of the first supercontinent, Rodinia,
were scattered, with the largest piece, Gondwana, The numerous convection cells (see p.43) that gave rise to the lying in the south. The Iapetus Ocean separated first fragments of continental crust gradually gave way to fewer, Laurentia (North America) from Baltica (northern larger-scale convection cells as the mantle cooled. The continental Europe). The Panthalassic Ocean occupied most of fragments became consolidated into larger areas, and rifts the northern hemisphere. formed at the thinnest parts of the ocean crust, splitting it into large plates. When the density of the oceanic and continental plates became PANTHALASSIC OCEAN sufficiently different, the oceanic crust sank where it met the more buoyant continental crust, creating subduction zones. Since then, the evolution of LAURENTIA the oceans and continents has been dominated by plate tectonics (see SIBERIA pp.50–51). As the plates move, they IAPETUS carry the continents with them, with OCEAN oceans opening and closing in between. BALTICA GONDWANA
subduction zone convection cell drives plate motion
PLATE MOVEMENT
Crustal plates move around under the influence of convection cells, which reach deep down to the boundary between the outer core and the mantle.
“ancestral” North Atlantic lies between North America and Europe
SIBERIA
PANTHALASSIC OCEAN
2. DEVONIAN (400 MYA) AUSTRALIA
EURAMERICA
RHEIC OCEAN
GONDWANA
The Rheic Ocean opened when a string of islands, which were to become western and southern Europe, broke away from Gondwana and moved towards Laurentia and Baltica, closing the Iapetus Ocean in the process.
scattered remnants of Rodinia
shallow continental -shelf seas Ural Mountains
southern Europe joins Euramerica (Laurentia and Baltica) as Iapetus Ocean closes
first plants on land form vegetated areas
PANTHALASSIC OCEAN
PALEOTETHYS SEA
INTRODUCTION
THROUGH THE AGES As the Earth’s plates have moved around, largely driven by the spreading ridges and subduction zones of the rapidly recycling oceanic crust (see p.50), continents have come together and moved apart – periodically grouping together to form “supercontinents”. The German scientist Alfred Wegener proposed that 250 million years ago (mya) there was a supercontinent called Pangea, centred on the Equator and surrounded by one great ocean. It seems there was another grouping about 1,000 million years ago called Rodinia, and perhaps an earlier grouping before that. Each time that the continental landmasses have come together they have eventually been broken apart as deep rifts have opened up in their interiors, as is happening today in the Red Sea and Great Rift Valley of East Africa. Computer models of the crustal fragments and the locations of spreading and subduction have enabled fairly reliable reconstructions of the geography of earlier times back to 500 million years ago.
PANGAEA SOUTH AMERICA
extensive deserts
AUSTRALIA
AFRICA
GONDWANA southern ice cap covers most of South America, Africa, and Australia
3. CARBONIFEROUS (300 MYA) As the supercontinent Pangea came together, continental masses stretched from pole to pole, almost encircling the Paleo–Tethys Sea to the east. Today’s coal seams were laid down in swampy forests along the shores of equatorial shelf seas. An extensive ice cap built up as Gondwana moved over the South Pole.
KEY
subduction zone spreading ridge outline of modern landmass
the evolution of the oceans PEOPLE
EPICONTINENTAL SEAS
!,&2%$7%'%.%2
At most times in the past, sea levels have been higher than they are today. This has given rise to shallow, tideless bodies of water called epicontinental seas covering extensive parts of the continental interiors. These were quite unlike the deep ocean basins and continental-shelf seas familiar to us today. The area of dry land was sometimes reduced to half its current extent by these seas, which were often very salty, low in oxygen, and devoid of life. They could isolate parts of continents, causing populations of living things to evolve separately. Epicontinental seas also affected the climate: their high salinity produced downwelling (see p.60) of dense water into adjacent equatorial oceans, in contrast to the polar downwelling that dominates the deep-ocean circulation today.
!LFRED7EGENER WAS A'ERMANSCIENTISTWITHINTERESTS INASTRONOMY METEOROLOGY AND GEOLOGY)NHEPRESENTED THETHEORYOFCONTINENTALDRIFTTO EXPLAINTHEPRESENCEOFIDENTICAL ROCKSONOPPOSITESIDESOFTHE !TLANTIC/CEANANDTROPICALPLANT FOSSILSINTHE!RCTIC#IRCLE(ISIDEAS WERENOTACCEPTEDUNTILSEA FLOOR SPREADINGWASDISCOVERED PROVIDING AMECHANISMTOEXPLAINHISTHEORY
47
SHALLOW WATER
4. JURASSIC (150 MYA)
Conditions on the shore of North America’s Western Interior Seaway 100 million years ago may have been similar to the shallow lagoons of the Bahama Islands today (right).
central Atlantic starts to open
The Paleo–Tethys Sea closed as future parts of central Asia broke away from Gondwana and moved north, with the Tethys Ocean opening up behind them. The central Atlantic was opening, splitting Pangea into northern and southern components.
LAURASIA NORTH AMERICA
PAC I F I C OCEAN
ASIA
EUROPE
TETHYS OCEAN
AFRICA SOUTH AMERICA
GONDWANA AUSTRALIA
opening of north Atlantic splits apart Europe and North America
ANTARCTICA
rifting signals creation of floor of modern Pacific Ocean
Western Interior Seaway
high sea levels
ARCTIC OCEAN
polar ice cap lost NORTH AMERICA
ASIA EUROPE
5. CRETACEOUS (100 MYA) The break-up of Gondwana started with India, Africa, and Antarctica rifting apart. This also started the closure of the Tethys Ocean. The opening of the south Atlantic soon followed, Europe separated from North America, and the Arctic Ocean opened over the North Pole.
PAC I F I C OCEAN SOUTH AMERICA
INDIA AUSTRALIA
Turgai Seaway
ANTARCTICA ANTARCTICA
Gondwana breaks up
Isthmus of Panama yet to close
remnants of Tethys Ocean EUROPE
ASIA
AFRICA INDIA
SOUTH AMERICA
INDIAN OCEAN AUSTRALIA
Antarctic ice cap begins to form
ANTARCTICA
India continued its rapid movement north, which would end with the uplift of the Himalayas when it hit Asia. Africa’s convergence with Europe closed the western Tethys Ocean. Australia and South America both separated from Antarctica, allowing the establishment of the Circumpolar Current that isolated Antarctica from equatorial heat flow. Australia moves north
INTRODUCTION
6. EOCENE (50 MYA)
ATLANTIC OCEAN PAC I F I C OCEAN
TETHYS OCEAN
AFRICA
ocean geology
48
CURRENTS, CONTINENTS, AND CLIMATE Along with the atmosphere, the oceans are the means by which heat is redistributed around Earth. Most energy arriving from the Sun is absorbed as heat near the equator. It is then redistributed to colder regions. About 40 percent of the heat reaching the poles from the equator comes via ocean currents. The pattern of circulation in the oceans therefore has a large influence on Earth’s climate (see pp.66–67). As continents, oceans, and currents have shifted through geological time, major climate changes have occurred. Conversely, warmer and colder periods affect sea level and the extent of seas. There is even evidence that the ocean froze to a depth of 6,500 ft (2,000 m) in places during a series of “snowball” events 750–580 million years ago, and possibly earlier, each event lasting up to 10 million years.
During snowball events, global glaciation would have left only the peaks of the highest mountains free of ice, as is the case today in Antarctica.
GREENHOUSE TO ICEHOUSE
MESOZOIC CURRENTS
100 million years ago, ocean currents flowed through a continuous seaway from the Tethys Ocean in the east, through what is now the Mediterranean, the Central Atlantic between North and South America, and into the Pacific in the west.
During the Mesozoic Era (252–65 million years ago) the climate was warmer than it is today, with a more even temperature distribution and no polar ice caps. Ocean currents freely flowed around the Equator, absorbing energy as they went, and carried heat to higher latitudes. The transition from this “greenhouse” climate to today’s cooler “icehouse” is due to shifts in ocean currents following the breakup of Gondwana. When the other continents moved north, the Antarctic was surrounded by the Circumpolar Current, blocking heat flow from the Equator. Equatorial flow between the oceans finally stopped when the Isthmus of Panama closed 5–3 million years ago. Antarctica now lies over the South Pole, allowing snow to accumulate into a thick ice cap, which reflects energy rather than absorbing it.
TODAY’S CIRCULATION
Today, equatorial ocean currents are blocked by landmasses, and the Circumpolar Current is the strongest current, blocking heat flow to the South Pole. The polar regions are colder.
English Channel land bridge
Beringia land bridge
Greenland Ice Sheet Cordilleran Ice Sheet
Laurentide Ice Sheet
Patagonian Ice Sheet
Gulf of Persia dry Siberian Ice Sheet
Scandinavian Ice Sheet
sea ice
Antarctic Ice Sheet
INTRODUCTION
SNOWBALL EARTH
Sunda land bridge
Sahul land bridge
Yellow Sea dry
LAST ICE AGE (21,000 YEARS AGO)
Today’s climate swings between cold ice ages and warm interglacials on a 100,000year cycle. During ice ages, northernhemisphere ice caps expand, lowering global sea levels and revealing land bridges.
ocean geology
50
TECTONICS AND THE OCEAN FLOOR THE THEORY OF PLATE TECTONICS HAS REVOLUTIONIZED the geology over the last half century, explaining many of Earth’s physical features. Tectonic plates are huge fragments of Earth’s lithosphere, which consists of the crust fused with the upper mantle. They move over a more ductile, or plastic, layer of the mantle called the BASALT asthenosphere. Plate motion builds mountain ranges, but plateThe ocean floor is largely made of a fine-grained igneous rock tectonic processes are perhaps most clearly seen on the ocean basalt, derived from the upper mantle. It is floor, where most of the plate boundaries are found. a dense rock, due to a high proportion of iron and magnesium. rising mantle plume forms mid-ocean ridge at surface
RECYCLING OCEAN CRUST
rigid lithosphere (crust and upper mantle) plastic asthenosphere lithospheric plate pushed away from ridge
The oldest rocks on the ocean floor are 180 million years old. This is young compared with the oldest continental rocks, which date from 3.8 billion years ago. While the continental crust has been steadily accumulating throughout Earth’s history, it seems the oceanic crust is created and destroyed rather quickly. It is created at the mid-ocean ridges from hot material rising in the mantle, and then spreads away from the ridges, before eventually being recycled into the mantle at subduction zones. Continental crust is always less dense and more buoyant than oceanic crust, so where they meet, it is the oceanic crust that gives way, sinking (subducting) back into the mantle.
AGE OF THE OCEAN FLOOR
The age of the ocean floor increases away from the spreading ridges where new crust is forming. The map below shows the East Pacific Rise to be the fastestspreading ridge, since it is flanked by the broadest spread of young rock (shaded red and orange).
MANTLE CONVECTION
Convection cells in Earth’s mantle are the driving force behind plate tectonics. The cycle of hot material rising, cooling, spreading out, and sinking pushes and pulls the lithospheric plates around.
oceanic crust descends under continental crust at subduction zone
PLATE BOUNDARIES
KEY ocean ridges at divergent plate boundaries direction of plate movement
transform plate boundary
144
age (millions of years) 154
89
127
54.8
65
24
33.5
1.8
5
undated
DIVERGENT AND TRANSFORM BOUNDARIES
At divergent boundaries, parallel ridges
INTRODUCTION
0
The boundaries of a tectonic plate may be emerge as new ocean floor spreads out on divergent, convergent, or transform. At either side of an ocean ridge. A transform boundary arises when sections of the ridge are divergent boundaries, the crust is extended, offset by different spreading rates. thinned, and fractured by the upwelling of hot mantle material. The crust buoys up, producing oceanic movement continent compressed, a mid-ocean ridge, and lava is extruded through trench of oceanic forming volcanic plate mountains a central rift valley to create new oceanic crust. magma Seamount volcanoes may also arise (see p.174). rises from Plates collide at convergent boundaries. Where mantle oceanic crust meets continental crust, the latter movement may be compressed and thickened, resulting in mountainmovement of of oceanic continental plate plate building. The dense oceanic plate sinks beneath the lighter continental plate, forming an ocean trench (see p.183), and volcanic activity occurs as the crust descends into the mantle. CONVERGENT BOUNDARIES magma Where two ocean plates meet, the oldest, most dense plate is Ocean crust is destroyed by forms subduction at convergent subducted and an arc of volcanic islands is formed parallel to as plate boundaries. The subducting descends the trench. Transform boundaries arise where plates are moving plate carries water with it, past each other. No crust is created or destroyed, nor is there any which allows the surrounding ocean plate subducted volcanic activity. They can occur where segments of a divergent mantle to melt, forming oceanic crust beneath continental plate explosive volcanoes above. boundary are offset, and extensive fracture zones can result.
OCEAN WATER IS constantly in motion, and
not simply in the form of waves. Throughout the oceans, there is a continuous circulation of seawater, both across the surface and more slowly deeper down. Several related processes play a part in causing and maintaining these ocean currents. They include solar heating of the atmosphere, prevailing winds, the effect of Earth’s rotation, and processes that affect the temperature and salinity of surface waters. The various surface currents that are generated, some warm, some cold, have profound effects on climate in many parts of the world. Oceanic processes also play a part in the periodic climatic disturbances called El Niño and La Niña, and they help generate the extreme weather phenomena known as hurricanes and typhoons.
CI R CU L ATION A N D C L I M ATE WHIRLING CLOUDS
These spiraling cloud patterns, caused when prevailing ocean winds encounter an island, are known as von Karman vortices. They were photographed from space over Guadalupe Island, near the Pacific coast of Mexico.
circulation and climate
54
polar easterly
OCEAN WINDS
over the oceans results from solar heating of the atmosphere and Earth’s rotation. This pattern of winds is modified by linked areas of low and high pressure (cyclones and anticyclones), which continually move over the oceans’ surface. Near coasts, additional onshore and offshore breezes are common. These are caused by differences in the capacity of sea and land to absorb heat.
THE PATTERN OF AIR MOVEMENT
Solar heating causes the air in Earth’s atmosphere to CIRCULATION CELLS The atmospheric cells cycle around the globe in three sets of giant loops, produce north–south called atmospheric cells. Hadley cells are produced by airflows. These are by Earth’s warm air rising near the equator, cooling in the upper modified spin, producing winds atmosphere, and descending to the surface around that blow diagonally. subtropical latitudes (30oN and S). Then the air moves back toward the equator. Ferrel cells are produced by air rising around subpolar latitudes (60oN and S), cooling and falling in the subtropics, and then moving toward the poles. Polar cells are caused by air descending at the poles and moving toward the equator.
Earth’s rotation initial direction of air movement
THE CORIOLIS EFFECT The atmospheric cells cause air to move in a north–south direction. This is altered by the Coriolis effect, which is a consequence of Earth’s spin. Because Earth turns continuously underneath the airflow as it travels, the air appears to be deflected from its straight north–south course. It veers to the east when moving away from the equator, and to the AIR DEFLECTIONS In the northern hemisphere, west when moving toward it. The Coriolis the Coriolis effect causes all air movements to be effect is an apparent, deflected to the right of not a true, force. No their initial direction. In actual force is exerted the southern hemisphere, on the wind. they veer to the left.
air deflected to right
air deflected to left
westerlies
northeasterly monsoon (Nov–Mar)
polar northeasterlies
westerlies
northeasterly trade winds
INTRODUCTION
Tropic of Cancer
Intertropical Convergence Zone
Ferrel cell air descends in subtropical latitudes
southwesterly wind
Hadley cell air rises at equator
direction of Earth’s spin
ATMOSPHERIC CELLS
initial direction of air movement
air rises in subpolar latitudes
polar cell
polar-front jet stream—narrow ribbon of strong wind at high altitude at top of front
equator
Tropic of Capricorn
northeasterly trade wind southeasterly trade wind
subtropical jet stream
trade winds meet at Intertropical Convergence Zone
air descends at pole
DISCOVERY
3!4%,,)4%)-!').' 4HEGLOBALPATTERNOFOCEANWINDS ISMONITOREDBYANINSTRUMENT CALLEDASCATTEROMETERONBOARDTHE .!3!SATELLITE1UIK3CATRIGHT !SCATTEROMETERISA RADARDEVICETHATCAN MEASUREBOTHWIND SPEEDANDDIRECTION BREWING STORM
In this QuikScat image of an Atlantic storm, orange areas show the strongest winds.
PREVAILING WINDS The winds produced by pressure differences and modified by the Coriolis effect are called the prevailing winds. In the tropics and subtropics, the air movements toward the equator in Hadley cells are deflected to the west. These are known as trade winds. They comprise the northeasterly trades in the Northern Hemisphere, and southeasterly trades in the south. At higher latitudes, the surface winds in Ferrel cells deflect to the east, producing the westerlies. In the Southern Hemisphere, these winds blow from west to east without meeting land. Those around latitudes of 40oS are known as the Roaring Forties. In polar regions, winds deflect to the west as they move away from the poles. These are known as polar northeasterlies and southeasterlies. KEY
prevailing warm southeasterly trade winds
westerlies
southeasterly trade winds
southeasterlies
southeasterly trade winds
westerlies
southwesterly monsoon (Apr–Oct)
prevailing cool local warm local cool
PATTERN OF WINDS
Year-round, the winds over most oceans are trades or westerlies. An exception is the northern Indian Ocean— this has a monsoon climate, in which a seasonal switch in wind direction occurs.
55
LONG-HAUL SAILING
Winds can blow with a consistent strength and direction over large areas of ocean. Consequently, on long-haul sailing trips, the same basic sail settings can often be used for days on end.
air ascends from cyclone
PRESSURESYSTEM WINDS
warm air rising air descends into anticyclone low pressure at center
central area of high pressure cold air sinks
air spirals around central area of low pressure cold air flows toward area of low pressure
air moving from high to low pressure deflected by Coriolis effect to form spiral
In any area of ocean where air sinks—often at subtropical latitudes—a zone of high atmospheric pressure, or anticyclone, develops. Where warm air rises, areas of low pressure, called cyclones or depressions, occur. These often develop near the equator and subpolar latitudes. Cyclones and anticyclones create linked, circulating wind patterns, which continually move and change. In the Northern Hemisphere, there is a clockwise movement of air around an anticyclone, and a counterclockwise motion CYCLONES AND ANTICYCLONES around a cyclone. This pattern is reversed in the Air moves from an area of Southern Hemisphere. Local pressure systems can affect high pressure toward one the general pattern of prevailing winds. In particular, of low pressure, but the cyclones move swiftly over the ocean and can produce Coriolis effect modifies this, producing circular winds. rapid changes in wind strength and direction. warm air cools at high altitude
COASTAL BREEZES
cold air sinks
DAY AND NIGHT
Land heats up faster
On warm coasts, there is often a noticeable drop in temperature from midday as a cool sea breeze blows in off the water. The breeze typically reverses in the evening and at night.
INTRODUCTION
BREEZY COAST
Local winds, called onshore and offshore than water during the day. air heats up Warm air rises over the and rises over cool air breezes, are generated near coasts, especially in land drawn in land and draws in cold air sunny climes. Onshore breezes—sometimes from the sea. At night, the called sea breezes—develop during the day. land cools more quickly, These are caused by the land heating up more reversing the airflow. quickly than the sea, as both absorb solar radiation. This occurs because the sea absorbs ONSHORE BREEZE large quantities of heat energy with only a small rise in temperature, whereas the same amount of heat energy is cold air sinks air heats up likely to cause the land temperature to rise sharply (see p.33). cool air drawn and rises As the land warms up, it heats the air above it, causing the air to rise. over ocean seaward Cooler air then blows in from the sea to take its place. In the evening, and at night, the opposite effect occurs. At nightfall, the land quickly cools down, but the sea remains warm and continues to heat the air above it. As this warm air rises, it sucks the cooler air off the land, and so generates an offshore breeze. This is sometimes called a “land breeze.” OFFSHORE BREEZE
TRIMMING THE SAILS
A crew sets their sails as they set off on the Sydney-to-Hobart yacht race. The course crosses the often stormy Bass Strait between Australia and Tasmania.
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SURFACE CURRENTS FLOWING FOR ENORMOUS DISTANCES within the upper regions of the oceans are various wind-driven currents. Many join to produce large circular fluxes of water, called gyres, around the surfaces of the main ocean basins. Surface currents affect only about 10 percent of ocean water, but they are important to the world’s climate (see p.66), because their overall effect is to transfer huge amounts of heat energy from the tropics to cooler parts of the globe. They also impact shipping and the world’s fishing industries. direction of
Coriolis deflection wind
frictional wind drag
WIND ON WATER
resultant direction of water motion
When wind blows over the sea, it causes the upper ocean to move, creating a current. However, the water does not move in the same direction as the wind. Instead, it moves off at an angle—to the right in the Northern Hemisphere and to the left in the Southern Hemisphere. This phenomenon was first explained in 1902 by a Swedish scientist, Walfrid Ekman, using a model of the effect of wind on water now called the Ekman spiral. The model assumes that the movement of water in each layer of the upper ocean is produced by a combination of frictional drag from the layer above (or, in the top layer, from wind drag) and the Coriolis effect (see p.54). The model predicts that, overall, a mass of water will be pushed at right angles to the wind direction, an effect known as Ekman transport. N. Atlantic Drift
Labrador N. Equatorial
E. Greenland
Gulf Stream
drag imparted from layer above direction of water motion
water motion in this layer
EKMAN SPIRAL Canary
Somali
Agulhas Oyashio
Alaska
Kuroshio N. Pacific California N. Equatorial
MAIN CURRENTS
Equatorial Counter
This map shows all of the world’s main surface currents, both warm and cold.
S. Equatorial E. Australia W. Australia
Antarctic Circumpolar Peru
S. Equatorial
Benguela
S. Equatorial
OCEAN GYRES
INTRODUCTION
North Pacific gyre
The combination of prevailing winds (see p.54) and Ekman transport produces large-scale, circular systems of currents known as gyres. All together there are five ocean gyres—two in each of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and one in the Indian Ocean. Each gyre westerly winds consists of several named currents. Thus, the gyre in the north Pacific is made up of the Kuroshio northeast current in the west, the California current in trade winds the east, and two other linked currents. Water tends to accumulate at the center of these gyres—producing shallow equator “mounds” in the ocean. southeast trade winds South Pacific gyre
westerly winds
direction of gyre direction of wind
warm current cold current
Brazil
GYRE CREATION
In the north Pacific, the combination of westerly and trade winds, always pushing water to the right (by Ekman transport) produces a clockwise gyre. In the south Pacific, where winds push water to the left, a counterclockwise gyre is created.
drag
The direction of motion in each water layer results from a combination of the drag from the layer above and a deflection caused by the Coriolis effect. This diagram shows the Ekman spiral in the Northern Hemisphere. In the Southern Hemisphere, deflection is to the left of wind direction.
surface currents
59
PEOPLE
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BOUNDARY CURRENTS The currents at the edges of gyres are called boundary currents. Those on the western side of gyres are strong, narrow, and warm—they move heat energy away from the equator. Examples of these currents are the Gulf Stream and the Brazil Current in the southwestern Atlantic. Eastern boundary currents are weaker, broader cold currents that move water back toward the tropics. Examples are the Benguela Current off southwest Africa and the California Current. At the gyre boundaries close to the equator are warm, west-flowing equatorial currents. Other currents feed into or out of the main gyres. These include, for example, the warm North Atlantic Drift, an offshoot of the Gulf Stream, and cold currents that bring water down from the Arctic, such as the Oyashio and East Greenland currents. WARM CURRENT
Satellite devices can detect phytoplankton levels in the water, which can be related to temperature. Here, yellow and red indicate high levels of plankton and the warm Brazil Current.
COLD CURRENT
In this satellite view, sea ice is visible flowing past the Kamchatka Peninsula in the cold Oyashio Current. Eddies within the current have produced spiral patterns in the sea ice.
MEETING OF CURRENTS In a few areas, warm and cold currents meet and interact. Examples include the meeting of the warm Gulf Stream with the cold Labrador Current off the eastern seaboard of the US and Canada, and the meeting of the cold Oyashio Current with the warm Kuroshio Current to the north of Japan. At these confluences, the denser water in the cold current dives beneath the water in the warm current, usually producing some turbulence. This can trigger an upward flow of nutrient-rich waters from the sea floor, encouraging the growth of plankton, and producing good feeding grounds for fish, sea birds, and mammals. SEA SMOKE
OPPOSING CURRENTS
INTRODUCTION
The warm Brazil Current on the left, and the colder Falklands Current on the right, each carry differently colored populations of plankton.
Dolphins cavort amid steep waves. The “sea smoke” is created when water vapor is added to cold air drifting across the boundary between cold and warm currents.
underwater circulation
61
DEEPWATER CIRCULATION downwelling of cold, salty water in north Atlantic
cold, dense water moves at depth through Atlantic
warm surface flow in South Equatorial Current
diffuse upwelling in Indian Ocean
Seawater circulates slowly through the deeper parts of the oceans, driven by water sinking in major downwelling zones, such as in the north Atlantic. Any specific mass of deep water has, at some time, sunk in one of these zones. Once it sinks, its properties, such as its salinity, remain stable for long periods—thus, every mass of deep water contains a “memory” of where it originally sank. By analyzing seawater samples from various parts of the deep oceans, it is possible to piece together the general pattern of deep-water flow. The indications are that there is a large-scale circulation involving all the oceans, called the global conveyor. A specific mass of seawater takes about 1,000 years to complete a lap of this circuit. diffuse upwelling in north Pacific Ocean
warm surface flow of North Equatorial Current in central Pacific
Atlantic water is joined here by more cold water formed near Antarctica
warm flow of Equatorial surface current through Indonesian archipelago
DISCOVERY
3%!,!)$ THE GLOBAL CONVEYOR
4HISDEEP DIVINGELEPHANTSEALIS HELPINGTOGATHERINFORMATION ABOUTUNDERWATERCIRCULATIONIN THESOUTH!TLANTIC!MEASURING DEVICE©ATTACHEDTOITSHEAD WITHGLUETHATSLOUGHSOFFWHEN THEANIMALMOLTS©COLLECTSDATA ABOUTTEMPERATUREANDSALINITYAT VARYINGDEPTHS4HEINFORMATION GAINEDMAYALSOHELPTOCONSERVE ELEPHANTSEALPOPULATIONS
The conveyor starts with cold, salty water sinking in the north Atlantic. Moving south at depth, it flows around Antarctica, branching into the Indian and Pacific oceans, and returns to the surface by mixing with warmer waters above. Finally, warm surface currents return it to the Atlantic.
combined mass of cold water moves slowly around Antarctica, at depth
cold, dense water flows north at depth into the Pacific Ocean
CIRCULATION CELLS
INTRODUCTION
One type of circulation that affects only the upper 70 ft (20 m) of the ocean, but is more complex than either a simple horizontal or vertical flow of water, is known as Langmuir circulation. This is wind-driven and consists of rows of long, cylinder-shaped cells of water, aligned in the direction in which the wind is blowing and each rotating in the opposite direction from its neighbor—alternate cells rotate clockwise and counterclockwise. Each cell is about 30–160 ft (10–50 m) wide and can be hundreds of yards long. On the sea surface, the areas between adjacent cells where seawater converges are visible as long white streaks of foam, or congregations of seaweed, called windrows. The whole pattern of circulation LANGMUIR WINDROWS long streaks of foam on the was first explained in 1938 by an American These sea surface are the windrows of chemist named Irving Langmuir, after he Langmuir circulation cells. The crossed the Atlantic in an ocean liner. distance between windrow lines increases with the wind speed. It was subsequently named in his honor.
DRIVING THE ATLANTIC CONVEYOR
Sea-ice formation on the margins of the Atlantic and Arctic helps to drive the Atlantic Conveyor. Only the freshwater component is incorporated in the ice, leaving dense, salty water that sinks to the ocean floor.
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64
GLOBAL WATER CYCLE a self-contained system but continually exchange water with the atmosphere and landmasses through evaporation, cloud formation, precipitation, wind transport, and river flow. This complex of interconnected processes, which is ultimately driven by heat from the Sun, is called the global water cycle or hydrologic cycle. The cycle is made up of many smaller cycles, such wind-driven clouds transport as the formation and melting of sea ice. water inland
THE WORLD’S OCEANS DO NOT FORM
GLOBAL WATER FLOW
Water enters the atmosphere mainly as a result of evaporation from the oceans and transpiration by plants. It condenses to form clouds and falls as rain and snow. On land, water moves downhill in rivers and glaciers. It soaks into the soil and rocks, and is stored in lakes and wetlands.
frozen water accumulates in glaciers
water returns to land in the form of snow return of water to land as rain
evaporation of water from lakes loss of water from plants by transpiration
water condenses into clouds as rising air cools
evaporation of water from ocean, driven by solar heating
melting of ice forms meltwater streams seepage of water into ground
downhill transport of water in rivers and streams
ocean water 97%
water discharges into ocean from rivers and streams
fresh water 3%
atmosphere 0.04% surface fresh water 0.5%
water returns to sea from ground
groundwater 24.46%
INTRODUCTION
EARTH’S WATER RESERVOIRS
PLAYERS IN THE CYCLE
The sea, ice, mountains, and clouds all play a part in the global water cycle. This coastal scene is near Port Lockeroy in Antarctica.
rivers 1%
Just over one-third of a billion cubic miles (1.4 billion wetlands cubic kilometers) of water exists on Earth. More than 12% 97 percent of this water is stored in the oceans as a component of salt water. The rest is fresh water. Of this, lakes 87% more than two-thirds is in the form of ice, locked up in the vast ice sheets that cover Antarctica and most of Greenland, and in icebergs and sea ice. Much of the rest is groundwater—contained in underground rocks—while a tiny amount (less than 1 part in 2,000) is water vapor in the atmosphere. Fresh liquid water on Earth’s land surface, in lakes, wetlands, and rivers, makes up just 0.5 percent of all the world’s fresh water, or 0.014 percent of the total water. Earth’s different water reservoirs have not always had the same relative sizes that they have today. For instance, during the ice ages, a higher proportion was locked up in ice, with less in the oceans.
EARTH’S WATER ice 75% FRESH WATER SURFACE FRESH WATER
RELATIVE SIZES
Earth’s ocean water (the bulk of the rear cylinder, above) hugely exceeds its reservoirs of fresh water, and the relative proportion of fresh water found on the land surface is tiny.
65
OCEAN EVAPORATION AND PRECIPITATION A total of 102,000 cubic miles (425,000 cubic kilometers) of water evaporates from the oceans per year. Of this, 93,000 cubic miles (385,000 cubic kilometers) falls back into the sea as precipitation (rain, snow, sleet, and hail). The remainder is carried onto land as clouds and moisture. Evaporation and precipitation are not evenly spread over the surface of the oceans. Evaporation rates are greatest in the tropics and lowest near the poles. High rates of precipitation occur near the equator and in bands between the latitudes of 45º and 70º in both hemispheres. Drier regions are found on the eastern sides of the oceans between the latitudes of approximately 15º and 40º. PEOPLE
3%.%#!4(%9/5.'%2 )NHISBOOKNatural Questions THE2OMAN STATESMAN DRAMATIST ANDPHILOSOPHER 3ENECATHE9OUNGER"#¨!$ PONDERED WHYOCEANLEVELSREMAINSTABLEDESPITETHE CONTINUOUSINPUTOFWATERFROMRIVERSAND RAIN(EARGUEDTHEREMUSTBE MECHANISMSBYWHICHWATER ISRETURNEDFROMTHESEATO THEAIRANDLANDAND PROPOSEDANEARLYVERSION OFTHEHYDROLOGICCYCLETO EXPLAINTHIS
FRESHWATER INFLOW The 9,000 cubic miles (40,000 cubic kilometers) of water lost from the oceans each year by evaporation and transport onto land is balanced by an equal amount returned from land in runoff. Just 20 rivers, including the Amazon and some large Siberian rivers, account for over 40 percent of all input into the oceans. Inflows from the different river systems change over time as they are affected by human activity and climate change. For instance, global warming appears to have increased the flow from Siberian rivers into the Arctic Ocean, as water frozen in the tundra melts. These inflows lower the salinity of Arctic waters and may influence global patterns of ocean circulation (see p.63). SIBERIAN LENA RIVER FLOODING
Climate change is thought to have contributed to severe flooding of the Lena River in recent years (below). A falsecolor satellite image (left) shows the engorged river in black; red areas are ice.
EQUATORIAL RAINSTORM
In some areas near the equator, as here in the tropical Pacific, annual rainfall is over 120 in (3,000 mm), compared to under 4 in (100 mm) in the driest ocean areas.
THE SEAICE CYCLE
SEA ICE FORMING
As sea ice forms, it releases heat to the atmosphere and increases the saltiness of the surrounding water (by rejecting salt). These processes affect climate and the circulation of seawater.
INTRODUCTION
In addition to the overall global water cycle, there is a local seasonal cycle in the amount of water locked up as sea ice. In the polar oceans, the extent of sea ice increases in winter and decreases in summer. This has important climatic consequences, because sea ice formation releases, and its melting absorbs, latent heat to and from the atmosphere; and because the presence or absence of sea ice modifies heat exchange between the oceans and atmosphere. In winter, sea ice insulates the relatively warm polar oceans from the much colder air above, thus reducing heat loss. However, especially when covered with snow, sea ice also has a high reflectivity (albedo) and reduces the absorption of solar radiation at the surface. Overall, the sea ice cycle is thought to help stabilize air and sea temperatures in polar oceans. Also, because it affects surface salinity, sea ice formation helps drive large-scale circulation of water through the world’s oceans (see p.61).
circulation and climate
66
OCEANS AND CLIMATE THE OCEANS HAVE A PROFOUND INFLUENCE on the world’s climate, most strikingly in the way they absorb solar energy and redistribute it around the world in warm surface currents. Cold currents also produce local climatic effects, while alterations in currents are associated with climatic fluctuations such as SOLAR HEATING surface layers of the oceans El Niño (see p.68). The future behavior of the oceans is crucial The absorb over half the solar energy to the future course of climate change, as they are an important that reaches Earth. Currents move this from the equator store for carbon dioxide, the principal greenhouse gas. toward the poles at a rate of about 1 billion megawatts.
WARM CURRENTS Five or six major surface currents (see p.58) carry heat away from the tropics and subtropics toward the poles, giving some temperate regions a warmer climate than they would otherwise enjoy. A prime example is the effect of the warm Gulf Stream and its extension, the North Atlantic Drift, on Europe. The North Atlantic Drift carries heat originally absorbed in the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico across the Atlantic, where it is released into the atmosphere close to the shores of France, the British Isles, Norway, Iceland, and other parts of northwestern Europe. As the prevailing westerly winds blow this warmed air over land, these countries benefit from a milder climate than equivalent regions at similar, or even lower latitudes, on the western side of the Atlantic. For example, winter temperatures are typically higher in Reykjavik, the capital of Iceland, BALMY BEACHFRONT than in New York. Similarly, in the northwest Penzance, in southwest England, has a mild climate that supports Pacific, the Kuroshio Current warms the subtropical vegetation—the southern part of Japan, while in the extreme effect of the North Atlantic Drift southwest Pacific, the East Australian Current is to raise temperatures here by about 9˚F (5˚C). gives Tasmania a relatively mild climate.
INTRODUCTION
COLD CURRENTS In some instances, the climatic effect of cold currents is simply to produce a cooler climate than would otherwise be the case. For instance, the west coast of the US is cooled in summer by the cold California Current. Cold currents also affect patterns of rainfall and fog formation. In general, the various cold currents flowing toward the equator on the eastern sides of oceans—combined with upwellings of cold water from the depths in these regions— cool the air, reduce evaporative losses of water from the ocean, and cause downdrafts of drier air from higher in the atmosphere. Although clouds and fog often develop over the ocean in these areas (as what little moisture there is condenses over the cold water), these quickly disperse once the air moves over land.Thus, cold currents contribute to the development of deserts on land bordering the eastern sides of oceans, such as the Namib desert in southwestern Africa.
COAST OF NORTHERN CHILE
The cold Peru Current flows along the coast of northern Chile. It encourages the development of clouds and fog over the sea (visible above left in the satellite image) but also contributes to the extreme aridity of the coastal strip (left).
342!9).'./24( -OSTPENGUINSLIVEIN!NTARCTICA BUT SOMEWHATSURPRISINGLY THE WORLDSMOSTNORTHERLY LIVING PENGUINSINHABITTHE'ALáPAGOS )SLANDS ONTHEEQUATOR4HE ISLANDSHAVEACOOLCLIMATE© SEA SURFACETEMPERATURESINMOST YEARSAVERAGE˚&˚# LESSTHAN TYPICALTEMPERATURESINTHE TROPICS DUETOTHECOLD0ERU #URRENTTHATFLOWSUPTHEWEST COASTOF3OUTH!MERICA
oceans and climate
CARBON IN THE OCEANS
FORAMINIFERAN SHELL
The oceans contain Earth’s largest store of carbon dioxide (CO2)—the main greenhouse gas implicated in global warming. Huge amounts of carbon are held in the oceans, some in the form of CO2 and related substances that readily convert to CO2, and some in living organisms. The oceanic CO2 is in balance with the atmospheric content of the same gas. For many years, the oceans have been alkaline, and acted as an important store for the excess CO2 released by human activity. Biological and chemical processes turn some of this CO2 into the calcium carbonate shells and skeletons of organisms, other organic matter, and carbonate sediments. However, the increasing CO2 concentration is beginning to acidify the oceans, threatening shell and skeleton formation in marine organisms, as acid tends to dissolve carbonates. Further, some scientists fear that the rate at which the oceans can continue to absorb CO2 will soon slow down, further aggravating global warming. CO2 released by plant respiration
CO2 absorbed by photosynthesis
CO2 released by fossilfuel burning
CARBON CONVERSION
CO2 released from burning fossil fuels (right), after absorption into the oceans, can eventually end up in the shells of marine organisms in the form of carbonate. CO2 released by volcanic eruption CO2 in rain weathers limestone
CO2 released by fossil-fuel burning
CO2 absorbed by photosynthesis by phytoplankton
CO2 released by land animal respiration
METHANE HYDRATE DEPOSIT
This substance is found as a solid on some areas of sea floor. There are concerns that ocean warming could release this into the atmosphere as methane gas, which traps more heat than CO2.
CO2 released by marine animal respiration
CO2 removed from storage by coal mining carbon from plant and animal remains stored in form of coal deposits
67
CO2 released by phytoplankton respiration
CARBON SOURCES AND STORES
At present, more CO2 is added to than subtracted from the atmosphere. Some of the excess is absorbed by the oceans, where some is held in solution and some incorporated into living organisms and sediments.
carbon released by decomposition of marine organisms
carbon released by decomposing phytoplankton
oil and gas
carbon in sediment turns into oil and gas
carbonate in sediment turns into limestone
The climate of San Francisco is influenced by exceptionally cold water, produced by upwelling, off the California coast. Fog is produced as westerly winds blow moist air over this cold water.
INTRODUCTION
GOLDEN GATE FOG
circulation and climate
68
EL NIÑO AND LA NIÑA climatic disturbances caused by abnormalities in the pattern of sea surface temperature, ocean currents, and pressure systems. They are in the tropical Pacific Ocean. These disturbances have important repercussions for weather throughout the Pacific and beyond. Most scientists regard El Niño and La Niña as extreme phases of a complex global weather phenomenon called the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO).
EL NIÑO AND LA NIÑA ARE LARGE
southeast trade winds
low-pressure system in western Pacific with rising warm, moist air and associated heavy rainfall
descending air associated with high pressure and dry conditions
EL NIÑO EVENTS The Spanish term el niño means “the little boy” or “Christ child.” It originally denoted a warm current that was occasionally noticed around Christmas off Peru. Later it was restricted to unusually strong rises in temperature in the waters of the eastern Pacific, with a reduction in the upwelling of nutrient-rich waters that normally occur there. It is now used to mean a much wider shift in ocean and atmospheric conditions that affects the whole globe. El Niño events typically last from 12 to 18 months and occur cyclically, although somewhat unpredictably. On average, they occur about 30 times per century, with intervals that are sometimes as short as two years and sometimes as long as 10 years. Their underlying cause is not understood. TEMPERATURE PATTERNS
pool of warm water South Equatorial Current
upwelling of cold, nutrient-rich water
NORMAL PATTERN southeast trade winds reverse or weaken
descending air and high pressure brings warm,
A low-pressure system in the western Pacific draws southeast trade winds across from a high-pressure system over South America. These winds drive the South Equatorial Current, which maintains a pool of warm surface water in the western Pacific. low pressure and rising warm, moist air associated with heavy rainfall
These satellite-generated images dry weather of the Pacific compare surface temperature patterns. Red and white indicate warm water; green and blue denote cooler water.
warm water flows eastward, accumulating off South America
EL NIÑO PATTERN
During an El Niño event, the pressure systems that normally develop in the Pacific, and the southeast trade winds, weaken or reverse. The pool of warm surface water extends from the western Pacific into the central and eastern Pacific.
JANUARY 29, 2001 (NORMAL)
upwelling blocked by warm water near surface DECEMBER 2, 2002 (EL NIÑO)
INTRODUCTION
EFFECTS OF EL NIÑO An El Niño event causes wetter-than-normal conditions, and floods, in countries on the western side of South America, particularly Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia. These conditions may also extend to the southeastern United States. In other parts of the world, it causes drier conditions. Drought and forest fires become more common in the western Pacific, particularly in Indonesia and parts of Australia, but also in East Africa and northern Brazil. The warmer waters in the eastern Pacific cause a reduction in the Peru Current and reduced upwelling near the coast of South America. This reduces the level of nutrients in the seawater, which has a negative impact on fish stocks. Other effects include a quieter Atlantic hurricane season and an increase in the extent of sea ice around Antarctica. Japan, western Canada, and the western US typically experience more storms and warmer weather than normal. width of rings directly related to amount of growth 1746–47 El Niño ring
EVIDENCE OF AN HISTORICAL EL NIÑO
Increased tree growth can be linked to high rainfall that occurred during historic El Niño events. One of the rings in this sample has been linked to an El Niño in 1746–47.
GIANT WAVES
During an El Niño event, storms become more frequent and violent in the central Pacific. These storms can produce gigantic waves, up to 33 ft (10 m) high, in Hawaii, as here on the island of Oahu.
CORAL BLEACHING
This small circular coral reef has suffered severe bleaching (whitening). El Niño events are often associated with bleaching caused by unusually high sea surface temperatures.
el niño and la niña DISCOVERY
LA NIÑA EVENTS
-/.)4/2).'
La niña is Spanish for “the little girl.” A La Niña event is the reverse of an El Niño event. It is characterized by unusually cold ocean temperatures in the eastern and central equatorial Pacific, and by stronger winds and warmer seas to the north of Australia. La Niña conditions frequently, but not always, follow closely on an El Niño. Like El Niño, La Niña causes increased rainfall in some world regions and drought in others. India, Southeast Asia, and eastern Australia are lashed by rains, but southwestern US generally experiences higher temperatures and low rainfall. Meanwhile, northwestern pool of warm states of the US experience colder, snowier water positioned winters. La Niña is also associated with an farther west than normal increase in Atlantic hurricane activity. Overall, the effects of a La Niña event often tend to be strongest during Northern Hemisphere winters.
4HETROPICAL0ACIFICISREGULARLY MONITOREDFORTEMPERATURE CHANGES4HEMAINMONITORING METHODSARETHEUSEOFSATELLITES WHICHMEASURESEATEMPERATURES INDIRECTLYFROMSLIGHTVARIATIONS INTHESHAPEOFTHEOCEANSURFACE ANDANARRAYOFINSTRUMENTED WEATHERBUOYS INSTRUMENTED BUOY
Buoys such as this one, strung in an array across the equatorial Pacific, are used to make regular measurements of water temperature at varying depths.
FOREST FIRES
In September 1988, during a La Niña event, forest fires raged in the western US. This fire in Yellowstone National Park produced winds of 55 mph (90 km/h).
low-pressure system, positioned farther west than normal
South Equatorial Current
southeast trade winds
69
descending air associated with dry conditions and high pressure
upwelling of cold, nutrientrich water
sea surface cooler than normal in eastern Pacific
LA NIÑA PATTERN
During a La Niña event, the area of low pressure in the western Pacific is farther west than normal, and the pool of warm surface water is also pushed west. Unusually cold surface temperatures develop in the eastern Pacific as the cold Peru Current strengthens off South America.
Three men help a woman trying to cross the overflowing Nepeña River, near Chimbote, Peru, during the 1997–98 El Niño event. This El Niño ravaged Peru, causing $3.5 billion of damage.
INTRODUCTION
PERUVIAN FLOOD
71
STORM SURGE
Hurricane Frances hits Juno Beach, Florida, in September 2004. Classed as a Category 2 hurricane when it hit land, Frances caused a storm surge 6 ft (2 m) high, which ripped across highways and flooded homes and business premises.
HURRICANE CATEGORIES A classification system called the Saffir-Simpson scale divides hurricanes into five categories. It is used to estimate the damage and flooding to be expected along a coast impacted by the hurricane. Wind speed is the determining factor in the scale. CATEGORY
WIND SPEED
HEIGHT OF SURGE
Tropical Storm
39–73 mph (63–118 km/h)
3–5 ft (1–1.5 m)
Category 1 hurricane
74–95 mph (119–153 km/h)
5–6 ft (1.5–2 m)
Category 2 hurricane
96–110 mph (154–177 km/h)
6–12 ft (2–3.5 m)
Category 3 hurricane
111–130 mph (178–209 km/h)
12–15 ft (3.5–4.5 m)
Category 4 hurricane
131–155 mph (210–249 km/h)
15–20 ft (4.5–6 m)
Category 5 hurricane
over 155 mph (249 km/h)
20–25 ft (6–7.5 m)
COASTAL EFFECTS As it moves across the ocean, the low-pressure eye of a tropical cyclone sucks seawater up into a mound, which can be up to 12 ft (3.5 m) above sea level for a Category 2 hurricane or 25 ft (7.5 m) for a Category 5. When the cyclone hits land, the water in this mound surges over the coast in what is known as a storm surge. The surge may flood homes, wash boats inland, destroy roads and bridges, and seriously erode a section of coastline up to 95 miles (150 km) wide. These effects compound the devastation caused by high CORAL DAMAGE winds, which can topple unstable buildings, uproot This colony of elkhorn coral trees, damage coastal mangroves, and bring was smashed by Hurricane down power lines. Human deaths are not Gilbert on Mexico’s Caribbean uncommon, so coastal areas threatened by coast in 1988. a severe cyclone are normally evacuated in advance. Offshore, the water movements associated with a storm surge can devastate coral reefs. In the Caribbean, branching corals that live near the surface, such as elkhorn corals, are particularly vulnerable. Healthy reefs can recover from such damage, although it can take 10–50 years, depending on the extent of injury.
WATERSPOUT
A swimmer watches heavy clouds associated with Hurricane Frances pass Cuba on their way toward Florida, 85 miles (140 km) to the north, in 2004.
Waterspouts are tornadoes (narrow, whirling masses of air) over the sea. They are quite commonly spawned around the edges of tropical cyclones.
INTRODUCTION
DENSE CLOUDS
WATER WORLD
Two days after the passage of Hurricane Katrina, about 80 percent of New Orleans was underwater, the result of breaches in the historic city’s floodwater defenses.
73
hurricane katrina Hurricane Katrina, which hit the Gulf Coast at the
The map below shows Katrina’s path between August 23, 2005, when the storm first developed as a depression over the Bahamas, to August 30, when it was downgraded to a tropical storm as it moved northward through the US. Katrina crossed Florida on August 25 and hit the Gulf Coast on August 29.
USA Tropical storm
Category 3 Category 4
New Orleans Gulf of
Tampa
Tropical storm
Mexico Category 5 Category 1 Category 4
Category 2 Category 3
CUBA
Tropical depression
LANDFALL IN FLORIDA FLOODING OF NEW ORLEANS
FORT LAUDERDALE, FLORIDA At 6:30 pm on August 25, 2005, Katrina made landfall on Florida’s east coast, just north of Miami. With winds of 80 mph (128 km/h), the coast was lashed by heavy rain and sandstorms. The hurricane caused two deaths, from falling trees, in the coastal city of Fort Lauderdale. Over the next 12 hours, the Florida death toll rose to 14.
BREACHED LEVEE Most of the flooding in New Orleans stemmed from breaches in the levees that protect the city from nearby Lake Pontchartrain. RESCUING RESIDENTS Three days after the hurricane struck, local volunteer teams were rescuing scores of stranded New Orleans residents by boat.
SMASHED HOMES Some of the worst of the hurricane damage occurred in the city of Biloxi, on the coast of Mississippi. The high winds and a storm surge about 33 ft (10 m) high— the highest ever along this coastline—devastated homes, restaurants, beachfront casinos, and shrimpfishing businesses. A total of 238 people died in Mississippi as a result of Hurricane Katrina.
STOPGAP REPAIR Twelve days after Hurricane Katrina struck, helicopters were still patching up New Orleans’ breached levees by dropping sandbags into them. Some of these levees were breached again, within two weeks, when an even more powerful hurricane, Rita, hit the Gulf Coast.
INTRODUCTION
These satellite images show Katrina’s appearance as it began to pass over Florida (top) and as it approached the Gulf Coast and New Orleans (bottom).
Category 1
COASTAL DEVASTATION
TRACK OF THE HURRICANE
PATH OF DESTRUCTION
REPAIRING THE DAMAGE
end of August 2005, was the deadliest hurricane to have affected the US since 1928 and was by far the costliest hurricane in history. When it occurred, Katrina was also the fourth-strongest Atlantic hurricane ever recorded. By April 2006, the official death toll from Katrina had reached 1,605, with many hundreds of people still listed as missing. Estimates of the amount of property damage had reached $75 billion. In addition to the deaths it caused, the hurricane brought extensive flooding to New Orleans. The city’s vulnerability to flooding is well established. Much of the city lies at a lower level than the surface of Lake Pontchartrain, to its north, and these parts of the city are protected from the lake and from the Mississippi River, which runs through its center, by reinforced embankments called levees. It had long been suspected that the levees would not stand up to the type of storm surge caused by a powerful hurricane such as Katrina, and this proved to be the case. When the storm struck, several of the levees failed. As the floodwaters receded, a massive cleanup was required. Some climate scientists believe that global warming will increase the frequency of high-intensity tropical cyclones like Katrina. If this is the case, governments in affected countries will need to make provision for dealing with similar-scale catastrophes at regular intervals in future.
WAVES AND TIDES are two important
physical phenomena that affect every area of the oceans but tend to be most noticeable, and have their main effects, on or near coasts. Ocean waves are mostly wind-generated and vary from tiny coastal ripples, to the regular, rolling swell of the open ocean, to monster breakers on worldfamous surfing beaches. All waves transmit energy—when the waves reach land, this energy may be dissipated destructively, eroding coastlines, or constructively, building up features such as beaches. Tides are caused mainly by interactions between the Moon and Earth. As well as regular rises and falls in sea level, they can cause strong currents around coasts and, in some places, even more dramatic phenomena such as whirlpools and eddies.
WAVE S A N D T I DE S LAPPING WAVES
Waves lapping on the seashore meet a rocky stream at low tide near Kipahulu on the southeast coast of the Hawaiian island of Maui, in the Pacific.
77
PLUNGING BREAKER
“Barrel” or “tube-forming” breakers like this occur when the waves reaching shore have large amounts of energy. The seabed must be firm and quite steep.
ARRIVAL ON SHORE SHOALING AND BREAKING
WAVE REFRACTION
When waves enter a bay enclosed by headlands, they are refracted (bent) as different parts of the wavefront encounter shallow water and slow down.
water motion caused by the wave begins to interact with the seabed and slow down
wave shortens in length and decreases in speed, but increases in height
wave reaches critical ratio of wave height to wavelength and break
wave finally breaks
water carried up shore in swash zone
HUMAN IMPACT
2)$).'4(%7!6%3 7HENASWELLREACHESASUITABLY SHAPEDBEACH ITCANPRODUCE EXCELLENTSURFINGCONDITIONS 3MALLSPILLINGBREAKERSAREIDEAL FORNOVICESURFERS WHILEEXPERTS SEEKOUTLARGEPLUNGINGBREAKERS THATFORMAªTUBE«THEYCANRIDE ALONG&ORTUBE RIDING THEBREAK OFTHEWAVEMUSTPROGRESSSMOOTHLY EITHERTOTHERIGHTORLEFT(ERE ASURFERRIDESARIGHT BREAKINGWAVE IN(AWAII©ITISBREAKINGFROMLEFT TORIGHTBEHINDTHESURFER
INTRODUCTION
As waves approach a shore, the motion they generate deep down begins to interact with the sea floor. This Shoaling occurs as slows the waves down and causes the crests in a series waves enter shallow water. The waveof waves to bunch up—an effect called shoaling. The length and speed period of the waves does not change, but they gain both decrease, but height as the energy each contains is compressed into the wave gains height. When the a shorter horizontal distance, and eventually break. crest gets too steep, There are two main types of breakers. Spilling it curls and breaks. breakers occur on flatter shores: their crests break and cascade down the front as they draw near the shore, dissipating energy gradually. In a plunging breaker, which occurs on steeper shores, the crest curls and falls over the front of the advancing wave, and the whole wave then collapses at once. Waves can also refract as they reach a coastline. This concentrates wave energy onto headlands (see p.93) and shapes some types of beaches (see p.106).
water motion occurs offshore to depth of half the wavelength
80 HUMAN IMPACT
3526)6).'4(% /,$3/7
MINI-VORTEX
This mini-whirlpool, about 20 ft (6 m) wide and 16 in (50 cm) deep, would be called a “piglet” by experienced Old Sow watchers. Sometimes, several of these small vortices occur, rather than a single large whirlpool. ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
The Old Sow Whirlpool FEATURES
Tidal race, small whirlpools, occasional large whirlpool TIMING
Four times daily Between Deer and Indian Islands, New Brunswick, Canada, and Moose Island, Maine, US
LOCATION
Situated in Passamaquoddy Bay on the US–Canada border, the Old Sow is one of the largest whirlpools in the world, and by far the largest in the
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Lofoten Maelstrom FEATURES
Tidal race and large, weak eddy TIMING
Four times daily Between Lofoten Point and Mosken in the Lofoten Islands, off northwest Norway
LOCATION
INTRODUCTION
Also known as the Moskenstraumen, the Lofoten Maelstrom is a complex pattern of sea-surface disturbances caused by tidal flows of water over
TIDAL DISTURBANCE
For centuries, the Lofoten Maelstrom had a reputation as one of the world’s most powerful tidal phenomena.
Americas. Passamaquoddy Bay is at the lower end of the Bay of Fundy, which is famous for its strong tides. The Old Sow, when it appears, is located at a spot in the bay where various tidal streams flowing through the channels between
different islands converge during the ebb tide or diverge during the flood tide. As they flow, these currents encounter underwater obstructions, such as ledges and small seamounts, so
COASTAL SETTING
The Old Sow develops between Deer Island (top), Indian Island (right), and Moose Island (foreground).
a broad, submerged ledge of rock between two of the Lofoten Islands. These flows result from large sea-level differences that develop four times a day between the Norwegian Sea and the Vestfjord on the eastern side of the Lofoten Islands. The word “maelstrom” originates with the tidal phenomena in this area, and is derived from the Nordic word male, meaning “to grind.” In Norse mythology, the Maelstrom was the result of a large salt-grinding millstone on the floor of the Norwegian Sea, which sucked water into its central hole as it turned. First described by the Greek explorer Pytheas in the 3rd century bc,
the Lofoten Maelstrom is marked on many historical charts as an enormous and fearsome whirlpool. In 1997, a detailed study of tidal currents in the vicinity of the island of Mosken found that the reality is somewhat different. Although some strong tidal currents were measured, no obvious large whirlpool, with a vortex, was detected. Instead, the researchers found a weak eddy, about 4 miles (6 km ) in diameter, to the north of Mosken. This eddy develops twice a day during the flood tide, when it moves in a clockwise direction, and twice on the ebb tide, when it moves slightly farther north and goes counterclockwise.
4HE/LD3OWHASCAUSEDABOUT ADOZENFATALITIESFROMDROWNING OVERTHEPASTYEARS-OSTOF THESEINVOLVEDMARINERSWHO STRAYEDTOOCLOSETOTHEWHIRLPOOL INSMALLROWBOATSORSAILBOATS )NRECENTTIMES AFEWPEOPLEIN POWERBOATSHAVEHADANXIOUS EXPERIENCESWHENTHEIRENGINES HAVESTALLED%XPERIENCED MARINERSADVISETHATIFCAUGHT INAWHIRLPOOL THEPRIORITYIS TOKEEPTHEBOATONANEVENKEEL ANDAVOIDGETTINGSWAMPED-OST OBJECTSFLOATINGINASTABLEPOSITION WILLEVENTUALLYSPINCLEAR as they reach their maximum speed of up to 17 mph (28 km/h), the whole sea surface in this area becomes rough and disordered. Typical disturbances include standing waves, troughs (long depressions in the surface), and “boils” (smooth circular areas where water spouts up from deep below). Occasionally and unpredictably, the Old Sow itself appears, forming a vortex that can be 100 ft (30 m) wide and 10 ft (3 m) deep. More often, one or several smaller vortices, known locally as piglets, appear. As with all tidal disturbances, these phenomena are more powerful during a spring tide, which occurs a day or two after a full or new moon.
PEOPLE
*5,%36%2.% 4HE&RENCHNOVELIST*ULES6ERNE MADEREFERENCETO THE,OFOTEN-AELSTROMINHISTALE OFUNDERSEAEXPLORATION Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea !TTHEENDOFTHENOVEL #APTAIN .EMOANDHISSUBMARINE Nautilus ARESUCKEDDOWNINTO THEWHIRLPOOL ªWHOSEPOWEROF ATTRACTIONEXTENDEDTOADISTANCE OFTWELVEMILES «SUFFERINGAN UNKNOWNFATE
81 ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Saltstraumen FEATURES
Tidal race and small whirlpools TIMING
Four times daily Between Saltenfjord and Skjerstadfjord, northwest coast of Norway
LOCATION
The Saltstraumen tidal race occurs on the northwest coast of Norway and is generally acknowledged to be the strongest and most extreme tidal current in the world. It forms at a bottleneck between the Saltenfjord, an inlet from the Norwegian Sea, and the neighboring Skjerstadfjord: its driving force is a difference in sea level of up to 10 ft (3 m) that develops four times a day between the two bodies of water. The channel at the center of the bottleneck—Saltstraumen itself—is a 2-mile- (3-km-) long strait between two headlands, with a width of just 500 ft (150 m) and a depth that varies from 65 to 330 ft (20 to 100 m).
Twice a day, some 105 billion gallons (400 billion liters) of water roar through this strait on the flood tide, reaching maximum speeds of up to 25 mph (40 km/h), as tidal forces act to fill the 30-mile- (50km-) long Skjerstadfjord. Twice a day, the waters flow out again through the same channel. The flows of water, and associated whirlpools, are equally strong during the ebb as the flood tide. Despite Saltstraumen’s ferocity, the channel is regularly used by shipping. For short periods every day, the tidal flows slow almost to a halt, allowing large vessels to pass safely into and out of Skjerstadfjord. Smaller vessels do remain at risk from residual underwater currents during these periods of “slack water,” but many experienced pilots still venture out. Saltstraumen offers both interesting opportunities for divers and excellent angling (see panel, below). Incoming tides carry large amounts of plankton through the channel, and fish of various sizes follow.
DANGEROUS WATERS
When the tidal race flows, the spinoff vortices, which can be 33 ft (10 m) across, are capable of pulling objects down to the rocky bottom of the channel.
DISCOVERY
,)&%"%.%!4(4(%7()2,0//,3 )TISPOSSIBLETODIVEINTOANDEXPLORETHE3ALTSTRAUMEN ALTHOUGHTHISCANSAFELYBEATTEMPTEDONLYWHENTHETIDAL STREAMSAREATAMINIMUM$IVERSHAVEDISCOVERED RICHANDCOLORFULMARINELIFEATTHEBOTTOMOF THECHANNEL DOMINATEDBYLONGSTRANDSOF KELPANDAVARIETYOFINVERTEBRATES AS WELLASFISHSUCHASLUMPSUCKERS COLEY ANDWOLF FISH TEEMING WITH LIFE
Invertebrate life at the bottom of the channel includes colorful sponges and anemones.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Corryvreckan Whirlpool FEATURES
Tidal race, standing waves, and whirlpools TIMING
Twice daily Between the islands of Jura and Scarba, west coast of Scotland, UK
LOCATION
SPIN-OFF VORTEX
In the whirlpool area, massive upthrusts of water occur in pulses, producing vortices that spin away with the tidal flow.
DISTURBED SEA
An area of disturbance begins to develop in the channel north of Jura, seen here with the island of Scarba lying behind it.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Slough-na-more Tidal Race FEATURES
Tidal race with eddies and standing waves TIMING
Four times daily LOCATION Between Rathlin Island and Ballycastle Bay, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, UK
The Slough-na-more Tidal Race results from strong tidal flows of billions of gallons of seawater between the Atlantic Ocean and the Irish Sea, via a narrow channel. During spring tides, the tidal stream can attain a speed of 8 mph (13 km/h). Where it passes Rathlin Island, a complex of fastmoving currents, eddies, and standing waves is created. In contrast, the same sea area is usually calm during other phases of the tidal cycle. In 1915, the strength of the Slough-na-more Tidal Race forced the Irish steam coaster SS Glentow aground on the Irish coast, and the ship later broke up.
INTRODUCTION
The most famous tidal phenomenon in the British Isles can be found in the Gulf of Corryvreckan. Twice a day on the flood tide, strong Atlantic currents and unusual underwater topography conspire to produce an intense tidal race. As the tide enters the narrow bottleneck at Corryvreckan, currents of up to 14 mph (22 km/h) develop. Underwater, these currents encounter a variety of irregular features on the
seabed, including a conical obstruction known as the Pinnacle, which rises to within 95 ft (30 m) of the surface. The steep east face of this obstruction forces a plume of water to the surface, producing whirlpools and standing waves up to 13 ft (4 m) high, and the roar of the rushing water can be heard up to 3 miles (5 km) away. Classified as nonnavigable by the British Royal Navy, the Corryvreckan has caused numerous emergencies and sinkings.
tides and waves
82
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Needles Overfalls
ATLANTIC OCEAN EAST
Garofalo Whirlpool
FEATURES
FEATURES
Tidal race and overfalls TIMING
Tidal race, small whirlpools, and overfalls
Four times daily
TIMING
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Yellow Bluff Tide Rip FEATURES
Tide rip, standing waves, and eddies
Four times daily
TIMING
Twice daily LOCATION
Needles Channel, northwestern coast of the Isle of Wight, England, UK
LOCATION Strait of Messina, between the northeast coast of Sicily and the south coast of Italy
The Needles Channel is a 5-mile(7-km-) long stretch of water between a line of chalk sea stacks on one side (the Needles) and an underwater reef on the other. This stretch of water is affected by short, breaking waves (overfalls) at the time of the maximum ebb or flood tide. If the wind is blowing in the opposite direction of the tidal stream, these overfalls are greatly exacerbated, producing an extremely rough sea.
The Strait of Messina separates the “toe” of Italy from the Mediterranean island of Sicily. It varies in width from 2 to 10 miles (3 to 16 km) and is the site of numerous complex currents and small whirlpools that vary over the tidal cycle and hamper navigation through the Strait. In Italy, the small whirlpools that form are called garofali, but in the English-speaking world, the whole system of tidal disturbances is known as the Garofalo Whirlpool.
A tide rip is a stretch of rough, turbulent water caused by a tidal current converging with, or flowing across, another current. Thus it differs from a tidal race, which occurs where a tidal stream of water accelerates through a narrow opening in a coast. An example of a tide rip occurs at a place called Yellow Bluff in San Francisco Bay, not far from the bay’s entrance, the famous Golden Gate.
One of the world’s most famous tidal races occurs at the Skookumchuck Narrows on British Columbia’s Sunshine Coast, not far from Vancouver (Skookum is a native American word for “strong” and chuck means “water”). Four times a day, there is a strong tidal rush of water through this 1,000-ft- (300-m-) wide channel, which connects two inlets into the coast—the Sechelt and Jervis inlets. A 10-ft (3-m) difference in sea level between low and high tide causes some 92 billion gallons (350 billion
liters) of seawater to rush through the gap, creating turbulence and some small whirlpools. On the flood tide, when water is flowing into the Sechelt Inlet (but not the ebb tide, when it flows out), the tidal stream across an outcrop of bedrock in the channel creates a large standing wave—a mound of breaking water that remains stationary at a particular spot on the surface. At its peak, the flow rate is about 4.75 million gallons (18 million liters) per second, and current velocities can reach 19 mph (28 km/h).
LOCATION
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Skookumchuck Narrows Tidal Race FEATURES Tidal race, small whirlpools, and standing wave on flood tide
Four times daily; flood tide twice daily
TIMING
LOCATION
Skookumchuck Narrows, British Columbia,
Canada
San Francisco Bay, California, US
Four times a day, strong movements of water occur through the Golden Gate—twice flowing into the bay on the flood tide and twice flowing out on the ebb tide. These currents can reach a speed of up to 5 mph (8 km/h) during spring tides. Inside the bay, the pattern of currents becomes more complex, as they either split (during the flood tide) or converge (during the ebb tide) from different parts of the bay. The currents are also modified by the varying depth of the water around the shoreline, by the shoreline’s shape, and by subsurface obstructions. At Yellow Bluff, disturbances to the sea surface are most noticeable during the ebb tide, when the tidal streams are converging, and are characterized by such phenomena as extremely rough, fast-moving water, standing waves, and eddies. The spot is popular with extreme kayakers, who challenge themselves against the strong currents and surf on the standing waves.
HUMAN IMPACT
352& +!9!+).'
INTRODUCTION
3KOOKUMCHUCK.ARROWSISA POPULARDESTINATIONFORENTHUSIASTS OFEXTREMESURF KAYAKING4HE STANDINGWAVETHATARISESTHERE ISUPTOFTM HIGHAND FTM WIDEANDISREGARDED ASONEOFTHEWORLDSGREATWHITE WATERKAYAKINGLOCATIONS7HEN SURF KAYAKING THEOBJECTISTOSTAY INTHEWAVEASLONGASPOSSIBLE WHICHREQUIRESSTRENGTHANDSKILL
POWERFUL RAPIDS
Here, water is flowing right to left, from the Sechelt Inlet into Jervis Inlet. Six hours later, it flows back in the opposite direction.
tides and waves
83
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
Naruto Whirlpool FEATURES
Tidal race and whirlpools TIMING
Four times daily LOCATION Naruto Strait, between the islands of Shikoku and Awaji, Japan
The Naruto is a spectacular system of whirlpools that develops four times a day in a narrow channel separating the island of Shikoku (one of Japan’s main islands) from Awaji Island, a much smaller island lying off Shikoku’s northeastern coast. The channel, called the Naruto Strait, is one of several that join the Pacific Ocean to the Inland Sea, which is a large body of water lying between Shikoku and Japan’s largest island, Honshu. Four times a day, billions of gallons of water move into and out of the Inland Sea through this channel, generated by tidal variations in sea level between the Inland Sea and the Pacific Ocean of up to 5 ft (1.5 m). The tidal flows can reach speeds of up to 9 mph (15 km/h) during spring tides (that is, twice a month, around the time of a full or new moon). They create vortices up to 65 ft (20 m) in diameter where they encounter a submarine ridge. These vortices are not stationary but tend to move with the current, persisting for 30 seconds or more before disappearing. The whirlpools can be viewed from Awaji Island, from sightseeing boats that regularly negotiate the rapids, or from a 4/5-mile- (1.3-km-) long bridge that spans the Naruto Strait. HUMAN IMPACT
!24)34)# ).30)2!4)/. 4HE.ARUTO7HIRLPOOLHAS EXISTEDSINCEANCIENTTIMES)TIS MENTIONEDMANYTIMESIN*APANESE POETRYANDISPOSSIBLYTHEONLY TIDALPHENOMENONTOFEATUREINA WELL KNOWNPIECEOFART NAMELY Whirlpool and Waves at Naruto, Awa Province BYTHETH CENTURY *APANESEARTIST5TAGAWA(IROSHIGE AFRAGMENTISSHOWNBELOW
A walkway hanging beneath the Oonaruto Bridge, which spans the Naruto Straits, provides an excellent view of the whirlpools below.
INTRODUCTION
TROUBLED WATERS
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
COASTS INCLUDE SOME of the most
beautiful, but also some of the most rapidly changing, places on Earth. There are a great many forms that they can take—from cliffs composed of anything from limestone to lava, to beaches, spits, and barrier islands, river deltas, estuaries, and tidal flats. Each coast has its own unique history of formation, brought about by processes such as land rise and fall, sea-level change, glacial and volcanic action, and marine erosion and deposition. On and around these coasts, a variety of habitat types— ranging from sandy coastal dunes to salt marshes, coastal lagoons, and, in the tropics, mangrove swamps—are shaped by the interaction of tidal flows, breaking waves, discharge of river sediment, and a variety of biological and human-induced processes.
COA S TS A N D TH E S E A S HORE SANDSTONE COAST
This dramatic Australian coastline consists of eroded sandstone strata beautifully shaped and sculpted by an azure sea.
coasts and the seashore
88
COASTS AND SEALEVEL CHANGE A COAST IS A ZONE WHERE THE LAND MEETS THE SEA—it extends from the shoreline inland to the first significant terrain change. Coastlines constantly alter in response to sea-level change, land-based processes, wave action, and tides. There are several different types of coasts, including drowned and emergent coasts. The processes that shape each are to some extent influenced by sea-level change, the causes of which may be global (as in oceanic melting of the world’s ice sheets) or local (involving local upward or downward movement of land causing local sea-level rise).
GLOBAL SEALEVEL CHANGE The most important cause of a global change in sea level is an increase or decrease in the extent of the world’s ice sheets and glaciers. This is related to Earth’s climate. If it cools, more water becomes locked up as ice, so there is less in the oceans. If it heats up (global warming), the ice melts and increases the volume of ocean water. Another cause of global sea-level change, which is also affected by climate, is a rise or fall in ocean temperature. Warming lowers the ice reduced ocean sheet density of water, so if the upper layers of the water continental crust oceanic oceans heat up, they expand and increase the depressed by crust ice total volume of the oceans. Any changes in the rises size of the ocean basins, the ocean’s containers, also impact globally on sea levels. For example, a change in activity at mid-ocean ridges can have such an effect and may be important in driving long-term sea-level change. increased ocean water
continental crust rises due to unloading of ice
GLACIAL CYCLES
OCEAN-BASIN CHANGE
During an ice age (top) the volume of ocean water is low as water is locked up in ice sheets. When the ice melts (bottom), the oceans expand, raising sea levels globally.
A slow, global rise in sea level can occur when new crust is produced at a fastspreading mid-ocean ridge. The relatively hot, buoyant new crust swells, pushing the ocean water upward.
old, dense crust
raised sea level
UPLIFTED TERRACE
This coastal region of New Zealand has experienced a localized sea-level fall in the recent geological past, as the land was significantly raised by an earthquake. What was beach is now flat clifftop.
upper mantle slow-spreading ridge
fast-spreading ridge
continental crust
younger, less dense crust has greater volume
oceanic crust depressed
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LOCAL SEALEVEL CHANGE
SINKING ISLANDS
These two volcanic Pacific islands, Rai’atea (top) and Bora-Bora, are subsiding. Locally, the current global rise in sea level is therefore slightly exacerbated.
Local sea-level change occurs when a particular area of land rises or falls relative to the general sea level. One of the main causes is tectonic uplifting of land, which occurs in regions where oceanic crust is being forced beneath continental crust (a process often associated with earthquakes). Another cause is glacial rebound, which is a gradual rise of a specific area of land after an ice sheet that once weighed it down has melted. During the last ice age, heavy ice sheets covered much of North America and Scandinavia. Since the ice melted, these regions have risen, and they continue to do so today at rates of up to a few inches a year. In contrast, other coastal areas are slowly sinking. Often, this occurs where a heavy load of coastal sediments is pushing the underlying bedrock down. A slow subsidence is occurring, for example, on the eastern coast of the US. Many volcanic islands also start to subside soon after they form. This is due to the fact that the material from which they are created cools, compacts, and then contracts, while the sea floor under them warps downward.
DROWNED COASTS A drowned (or submergent) coast is the result of a global or regional sea-level rise. There are two distinctive types—rias and fjords. In a ria coast, the sea-level rise has drowned a region of coastal river valleys, forming a series of wide estuaries, often separated by long peninsulas. In a fjord coast, the sea-level rise has drowned one or more deep, glacier-carved valleys. Both types are RIA COAST characteristically irregular and indented. Due to The coastline around a significant global rise in sea level over the past Hobart, in Tasmania, Australia, was formed 18,000 years, drowned coasts are common by a rise in sea level worldwide. Ria coasts are particularly prevalent flooding a series of river in northwestern Europe, the eastern US, and valleys. Here, the Hobart Australasia. Large numbers of fjords are present Bridge spans one such in coastal Norway, Chile, Canada, and New Zealand. drowned valley.
89
EMERGENT COASTS
PAST CHANGE
Emergent coasts occur where land has uplifted faster than the sea has risen since the last ice age. The causes are either activity at the edge of a tectonic plate or glacial rebound. On emergent coasts, areas that were formerly sea floor may become exposed above the shoreline, while former beaches often end up well behind the shoreline, or even on clifftops. Sometimes, staircaselike structures called marine terraces are created by a combination of uplift and waves gradually cutting flat platforms at the bases of cliffs (wave-cut platforms). Emergent coasts are typically rocky, but sometimes they have a smooth shoreline. Examples of these coasts occur on the US Pacific Coast and in Scotland, Scandinavia, New Zealand, and Papua New Guinea.
Scientists study past sea-level changes by examining rocks and fossils near shorelines. They also analyze ocean sediments to calculate past ocean temperatures and climatic properties. Over the past 500 million years, global sea levels have fluctuated by more than 1,000 ft (300 m). About 120,000 years ago, sea level was about 20–35 ft (6–10 m) higher than it is today, but some 18,000 years ago, it was about 400 ft (120 m) below today’s level. Most of the rise since then occurred prior to 6,000 years ago. From some 3,000 years ago to the late 19th century, sea level rose at about 1/254 –1/127 in (0.1–0.2 mm) per year. Since 1900, this has increased to 1/25–3/25 in (1–3 mm) per year.
RAISED BEACH
FOSSIL MAMMOTH TOOTH
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UPLIFTED CLIFFS
These marine cliffs in Crete, Greece (right), have been uplifted by tectonic activity, eroded, and finally tilted from the horizontal, also by tectonic activity.
The red dotted line on this map shows where the east coast of North America was 15,000 years ago. At that time, mammoths roamed on what is now continental shelf—it is not uncommon for a mammoth tooth (above) to turn up in fishing trawls from these areas.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
In this bay in the Hebridean Islands, Scotland (left), the green areas behind the beach are former beaches that have been raised by glacial rebound since the end of the last ice age.
SURROUNDED BY WATER
The Italian city of Venice currently floods up to 200 times a year and is severely threatened by future sea-level rise, although a project to build a tidal barrier was launched in 2003.
global warming and sea-level rise The measurement of global sea-level change is
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GLACIER RETREAT
EFFECTS OF GLOBAL WARMING
PERUVIAN ANDES Global warming is having a marked impact on the world’s glaciers. The majority have shrunk since 1975, as their ice has melted faster than new ice has formed. These photographs from the same viewpoint show the extent of a glacier in the Cordillera Blanca, Peru, in 1980 (left) and 2002 (right).
SUBMERGING ISLANDS
FUNAFUTI ATOLL This atoll is part of Tuvalu, a group of small, low-lying Pacific islands whose future existence is threatened by sea-level rise.
HIGH TIDE Homes on Funafuti Atoll are already flooded by lagoon waters from time to time during exceptionally high tides.
POPULATIONS AT RISK
complex and, until satellite-based techniques were introduced in 1992, was somewhat imprecise. During the 1980s, a consensus emerged that sea level had been rising at 1/32 –1/8 in (1–3 mm) per year since 1900, whereas the new satellite techniques indicate a current average rise of 1/8 in (2.9 mm) per year. Since 1900, there has also been a rise in the temperature of Earth’s atmosphere and oceans (global warming) of 0.7–1.4˚F (0.4–0.8˚C). There are two plausible mechanisms by which the temperature rise might be linked to the sea-level rise: first, through melting of glaciers and ice sheets, which increases the amount of water in the oceans; and second, through the expansion of seawater as it warms. Since there are no other convincing explanations of what might be causing the sea-level rise, the view of most scientists is that global warming is the cause. Based on different models of the future course of global warming (which most scientists now believe is linked to human activity), it is possible to make various predictions of how sea level will change in the future. For example, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that, by the end of the 21st century, there will be a further sea-level rise of 41/2–35 in (110–880 mm). This rise will displace tens of millions of people living in low-lying coastal areas and have a devastating effect on some small island nations. Continued global warming will eventually melt the Greenland Ice Sheet, raising sea levels by a little over 20 ft (6 m), flooding most of the world’s coastal cities.
CITY UNDER WATER Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, together with about three-quarters of the country’s land area, is less than 27 ft (8 m) above sea level. Much of the country would be flooded by melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet. A rise of 5 ft (1.5 m) would inundate one-sixth of Bangladesh and displace about 17 million people. The country is already severely affected by river floods.
SEALEVEL RISE IN SOUTHEASTERN US
OC EA N
ATLA NT IC
Gulf of Mexico
Miami
flooded area
61/2-ft (2-m) rise
Miami
Galveston New Orleans Gulf of Mexico
20-ft (6-m) rise
OC EA N
Miami
ANIMALS IN DANGER
Gulf of Mexico
ATLA
Galveston New Orleans
ATLA NT IC
Jacksonville Georgetown
NT IC
Jacksonville Georgetown
OC EA N
3-ft (1-m) rise
STARVED TO DEATH Polar bears are one of the animal species most severely threatened by global warming. The bears use Arctic sea ice as their summer hunting ground, and as the extent of sea ice diminishes, so do their opportunities for hunting and feeding.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
The maps below indicate the areas of the southeastern US that would be threatened by sea-level rises of 3 ft (1 m), 61/2 ft (2 m), and 20 ft (6 m). A 3-ft (1-m) rise is a little above the upper end of estimates for what can be expected this century. With this rise, parts of Florida and southern Louisiana would be inundated up to 18 miles (30 km) from the present coastline. If the Greenland Ice Sheet were to melt, which seems unlikely in this century but could happen within a few hundred years if global warming continues, a rise of a little over 20 ft (6 m) would Jacksonville submerge a large part of Georgetown Florida, while Louisiana would be flooded as much as 50 miles (80 km) inland Galveston New Orleans from the present coastline.
coasts and the seashore
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COASTAL LANDSCAPES A GREAT VARIETY OF LANDSCAPES ARE FOUND along the coastlines of the world’s oceans. Coasts are shaped by processes such as sea-level change and wave erosion, as well as by land-based processes such as weathering, erosion and deposition by rivers, glacier advance and retreat, the flow of lava from volcanoes, and tectonic faulting. Some coastal features are made by living organisms, including the reefs built by corals and the harbors, coastal defenses, and artificial islands built by humans.
FRINGING REEF
This reef-fringed coast, around the south Pacific island of Bora Bora, is a secondary coast, as it has been modified by the activities of living organisms, notably corals.
CLASSIFICATION OF COASTS Coasts can be classified as either primary or secondary. Primary coasts have formed as a result of land-based processes, such as the deposition of sediment from rivers (forming deltas), land erosion, volcanic action, or rifting and faulting in Earth’s crust. Coasts formed as a result of recent sea-level change, which include drowned coasts and emergent coasts (see pp.88–89), are also usually considered primary, as are coastlines consisting mainly of wind-deposited sand, glacial till, or the seaward ends of glaciers. Coasts are considered secondary if they have been heavily shaped by marine erosional or depositional processes, or by the activities of organisms, such as corals, mangroves, or, indeed, people. A few coasts—for example, emergent coasts that have undergone significant marine erosion—display both primary and secondary features and so fit into an intermediate category.
VOLCANIC COAST ARTIFICIAL COAST
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Singapore Harbor, in Southeast Asia, is an example of a coast that has been heavily shaped by human activity. Before human intervention, it was a mangrove-lined estuary.
SEA ARCH
This spectacular arch in southern England is known as Durdle Door. A remnant of a once much larger headland, it is a classic feature of a marine-eroded coast.
This land-eroded volcanic cone is in the Galápagos Islands. The entire coastline around these islands was formed by volcanic activity and so is a primary coast.
coastal landscapes
WAVEEROSION COASTS
energy concentrated on headland as wave front refracts
beach
Of all the different types of coastal landscape, perhaps the most familiar are wave-eroded cliffed coasts, a type of secondary coast. Wave erosion on these coasts occurs through two main mechanisms. First, waves hurl beach material against the cliffs, which abrades the rock. Second, each wave compresses air within cracks in the rocks, and on reexpansion the air shatters the rock. Where waves encounter headlands, refraction (bending) of the wave fronts tends to focus their erosive energy onto the headlands. At these headlands, distinctive features tend to develop in a classic sequence. First, deep notches and then sea caves form at the bases of cliffs on each side of the headland. Wave action gradually deepens and widens these caves until they cut through the headland to form an arch. Next, the roof of part of wave the arch collapses to leave an isolated rock front opposite pillar called a stack, and finally the stack is headland slows as it encounters eroded down to a stump. shallower water
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part of wave front opposite beach continues forward
erosion eventually divides headland into stacks
lobe of sediment
CONCENTRATION OF WAVE ENERGY
When a wave front reaches a shore consisting of bays and headlands, it refracts in such a way that wave energy tends to be concentrated onto the headlands.
wave front (extended crest of wave)
UNDERCUT CLIFF
SEA CAVE
SEA STACKS
Wave action has eroded a notch, and an adjoining platform, at the base of this cliff in the Caribbean.
This deep indentation and sea cave have been eroded into cliffs in the Algarve, Portugal.
The Old Harry Rocks are chalk sea stacks at a headland near Swanage in southern England. river current
salt marsh spit
headland
movement of sand along beach backwash
swash
MARINEDEPOSITION COASTS Marine depositional coasts are formed from sediment brought to a coast by rivers, eroded from headlands, or moved from offshore by waves. An important mechanism in their formation is longshore drift. When waves strike a shore obliquely, the movement of surf (swash) propels water and sediment up the shore at an angle, but backwash drags them back down at a right angle to the shore. Over time, water and sediment are moved along the shore. Where the water arrives at a lower-energy environment, the sediment settles and builds up to form various depositional features, including spits, baymouth bars, and barrier islands (long, thin islands parallel to the coast).
second most common wind and wave direction
direction of longshore drift
prevailing wind and wave direction
SPIT FORMATION
BAYMOUTH BAR
Where a spit extends most or all of the way across the mouth of a bay or estuary, the result is called a baymouth bar. Here, a bar across the mouth of an estuary in Scotland, and an older spit, have created a sheltered coastal area of sandflats and salt marshes.
CLATSOP SPIT
This aerial view shows the impressive Clatsop Spit, at the mouth of the Columbia River in Oregon. The spit extends for 2½ miles (4 km) across the river mouth and is still growing.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
On this coastline, sand and water is carried past the headland by longshore drift, but the sand settles at the mouth of an estuary where the waves are opposed by the sluggish outflow from a river. There it forms a slowly growing spit—a sandy peninsula with one end attached to the land.
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94
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
Greenland Ice Coast TYPE
Primary coast
Extension of ice-sheet to sea level in outlet glaciers
FORMATION
About 600 miles (1,000 km)
EXTENT LOCATION
Parts of western and eastern coasts of
Greenland
An ice coast forms where a glacier extends to the sea, so that a wall of ice is in direct contact with the water. This is a common feature around the highly indented margins of Greenland, mainly at the landward end of long fjords. Together, these ice walls form an interrupted ice coast, and they are the source of enormous numbers of icebergs, many of which escape the fjords and eventually reach the Atlantic. The ice coast extends along only a fraction of the total Greenland coastline, which is an astonishing 27,500 miles (44,000 km) long.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
Acadia Coastline TYPE
Primary coast
Glaciation, then drowning by sealevel rise
FORMATION
EXTENT
41 miles (66 km)
LOCATION Southeast of Bangor, Maine, northeastern US
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
ICE COAST NEAR CAPE YORK
STAIRWAY TO THE SEA
The tops of the columns form stepping stones that first lead up from the foot of the cliff to a mound and then progress downward until they dip below the sea.
The coastline of Acadia in Maine is one of the most spectacular in the northeastern US. It now forms the Acadia National Park, most of which
is found within a single large island, Mount Desert Island, and some smaller associated islands. Sea-level rise since the last ice age has separated these islands from each other and from the mainland. The mountains that make up the basis of this coastline began to form 500 million years ago from seafloor sediments. Magma (molten rock) rising up from Earth’s interior intruded into and consumed these sedimentary rocks, producing a mass of granite that was gradually eroded to form a ridge. About 2–3 million years ago, a huge ice sheet started to blanket the area, depressing the land and sculpting out a series of mountains
MOUNT DESERT ISLAND
The south-facing coast of Mount Desert Island consists of a series of fractured granitic steps that were produced by the action of glaciers some 100,000 years ago.
separated by U-shaped valleys. Since the ice sheet receded, the land has gradually rebounded upward, but global sea-level rise has caused the Atlantic to overtake the rebound at a rate of 2 in (5 cm) per century. Today, waves and tidal currents are major agents of change at Acadia, gradually eroding the cliffs and depositing rock particles mixed with shell fragments at coves around the coastline.
coastal landscapes ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
HUMAN IMPACT
Hatteras Island TYPE
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#!0%(!44%2!3 ,)'(4(/53%
Secondary coast
Deposition of sediment by waves and currents
FORMATION
%ROSIONANDDEPOSITIONOFTEN CAUSESHORELINESTOMIGRATE )N THE#APE(ATTERAS ,IGHTHOUSEWASMOVED BECAUSETHESEAHAD BEGUNTOLAPATITS BASE THREATENINGITS DESTRUCTION
70 miles
EXTENT
(112 km) Off the coast of North Carolina, northeastern US
LOCATION
Hatteras Island is a classic barrier island of sandy composition. It runs parallel to the mainland and is long and narrow, with an average width of 1,500 ft (450 m), and has been shaped by complex processes of deposition effected by ocean currents and waves. It is part of a series of barrier islands called the Outer Banks and has two distinct sections, which join at a promontory called Cape Hatteras. The dangerously turbulent waters in this area have resulted in hundreds of shipwrecks over the centuries.
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Les Pitons TYPE
Primary coast
Volcanic lava-dome formation followed by volcano collapse and erosion
FORMATION
EXTENT
41/2 miles (7 km)
Southwestern coast of St. Lucia, Lesser Antilles, eastern Caribbean
LOCATION
The southwestern coastline on the Caribbean island of St. Lucia is rocky, highly indented, and steeply shelving. A landmark here is Les Pitons (“The Peaks”), two steep-sided mountain spires, each more than 2,430 ft (740 m)
HATTERAS SHORELINE
Hatteras Island is a typical barrier island, being low-lying with wavestraightened shorelines.
NEW POSITION
The lighthouse is now located about 1,500 ft (450 m) back from the shoreline.
high. These are the eroded remnants of two lava domes (large masses of lava) that formed some 250,000 years ago on the flank of a huge volcano. The volcano later collapsed, leaving behind the peaks and other volcanic features in the area. The volcanic rocks on this coast are densely vegetated, except on the very steepest parts of Les Pitons themselves. Beneath the sea are some scattered coral reefs within a series of protected marine reserves. This region was declared a World Heritage Site in 2004. TWIN PEAKS
In this view, Petit Piton is the nearer peak, while Gros Piton, which is slightly higher and much broader, is visible in the background.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Giant’s Causeway TYPE
Primary coast
Cooling of basaltic lava flow from an ancient volcanic eruption
FORMATION
EXTENT 3/5
mile (1 km)
Northernmost point of County Antrim, Northern Ireland, UK LOCATION
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
The Giant’s Causeway is a tightly packed cluster of some 40,000 columns of basalt (a black volcanic rock). It is located at the foot of a sea cliff that rises 300 ft (90 m) on the northern coast of Northern Ireland. Although legend says the formation was created by a giant named Finn McCool, it in fact resulted from a volcanic eruption some 60 million years ago, one of a series that brought about the opening up of the North Atlantic. The eruption spewed up vast amounts of liquid basalt lava, which cooled to form the columns. They are up to 42 ft (13 m) tall and are mainly hexagonal, although some have four, five, seven, or eight sides.
coasts and the seashore
96
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Gruinard Bay TYPE
Primary coast
Ice-sheet retreat and postglacial rebound
FORMATION
EXTENT
8 miles (13 km)
West of Ullapool, northwestern Scotland, UK
LOCATION
Around Gruinard Bay in Scotland there is evidence of a phenomenon known as postglacial rebound, in which a landmass, once pushed down
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
White Cliffs of Dover TYPE
Secondary coast
Marine erosion of a large mass of ancient chalk
FORMATION
EXTENT
11 miles (17 km)
Southeastern coast of England, to east and west of Dover, UK
LOCATION
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
One of England’s most famous natural landmarks, the White Cliffs of Dover run along the northwestern side of the Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel. They are complemented on the French side of the Strait by similar cliffs at Cap Blanc
by the huge weight of ice sheets during the last ice age, rises again. In some areas, such as Scotland and Scandinavia, this upward rebound has outstripped the sea-level rise caused by the ice sheets melting. At Gruinard Bay, rebound is indicated by its raised beaches—flat, grassy areas behind the present-day beaches. Over the last 11,000 years, this part of Scotland has been moving upward relative to sea level at about 2 in (5 cm) per century. RAISED BEACH
The green area beyond the present-day beach, well above the line of high tide, is the remnant of an ancient beach.
Nez. The chalk from which the cliffs are composed was formed between 100 million and 70 million years ago, when a large part of what is now northwestern Europe was underwater. The shells of tiny planktonic organisms that inhabited those seas gradually accumulated on the sea floor and became compressed into a layer of chalk that was several hundred yards thick. Subsequently, as the sea level fell during successive ice ages, this mass of chalk lay above the sea, and it later formed a land bridge between present-day England and France. However, about 8,500 years ago, the buildup of a large lake in an area now occupied by the southern North Sea caused a breach
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Devon Ria Coast TYPE
Primary coast
Former river valleys drowned by sealevel rise
FORMATION
EXTENT
About 60 miles
(100 km) LOCATION Between Plymouth and Torbay, southwestern coast of England, UK
Much of the south coast of the English county of Devon consists of the drowned valleys of the Dart, Avon, Yealm, and Erme rivers, and the Salcombe–Kingsbridge Estuary. The inlets, also known as rias, are separated by rugged cliffs and headlands. This beautiful coastal area was formed by the partial flooding of valleys, through which small rivers once flowed, as a result of global sea-level rise since the last ice age. The rise in sea level has been accentuated by the fact that the southern and eastern parts of Britain have been tipping downward since the last ice age at a rate of up to 7 in (16 cm) per century, a trend that continues today. in the land-bridge. It eroded rapidly, causing flooding of the area that now forms the English Channel. Today, the cliffs at Dover continue to be eroded at an average rate of an inch or two per year. Occasionally a large chunk detaches from the cliff edge and falls to the ground. Many marine fossils have been discovered in the cliffs, ranging from sharks’ teeth to sponges and corals.
SALCOMBE–KINGSBRIDGE ESTUARY
The highly scenic Salcombe Estuary is the largest of the five rias on the south Devon coast. Its protected waters provide ideal conditions for sailing.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Cape Creus TYPE
Primary coast
Land-eroded rocky coastline of schists and other metamorphic and igneous rocks
FORMATION
EXTENT
6 miles (10 km)
Northeast of Girona, northeastern Catalonia, Spain LOCATION
HIGH CHALK CLIFFS
Up to 330 ft (100 m) high, these cliffs owe their remarkable appearance to the almost pure chalk of which they are composed.
AN EASTERLY POINT OF THE CAPE
Cape Creus marks the point where the mountains of the Pyrenees meet the Mediterranean Sea. It has one of the most rugged coastlines in the entire Mediterranean region, with cliffs made of extremely roughtextured rocks, interspersed by small coves. Designated as a natural park in 1998, Cape Creus also boasts a varied underwater marine life, and is rich in invertebrate animals such as sponges, anemones, fan worms, and red corals. As such, it is a popular diving location. The landscape is said to have inspired the Spanish surrealist artist Salvador Dali (1904–1989), and it features in many of his paintings, including The Persistence of Memory.
coastal landscapes
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ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Western Algarve TYPE
Secondary coast
Erosional action of waves on ancient rock strata
FORMATION
EXTENT
84 miles
(135 km) LOCATION Southern and southwestern coast of Portugal
BALANCED STACK
At Marinha Beach near Carvoeiro, wind and waves have produced distinctive rock formations, such as this eroded sea stack balanced on the shoreline.
ATLANTIC OCEAN EAST
ATLANTIC OCEAN EAST
Nile Delta
Amalfi Coast TYPE
The western Algarve coast extends from the city of Faro in southern Portugal to Cape St.Vincent, at the southwestern tip of the Iberian Peninsula, and then for a further 30 miles (50 km) to the north. This coastline, which is bathed by the warm Gulf Stream, is notable for its picturesque, honey-colored limestone cliffs, small bays and coves, sheltered beaches of fine sand, and emeraldgreen water. Many stretches of this coast show typical features of marine erosion at work, including caves at the feet of cliffs, grottoes, blowholes, arches forming through headlands, and sea stacks (isolated pillars of rock set off from headlands). Although limestone is a primary component of the landscape, other rocks, including sandstones and shales, form parts of the cliffs along scattered stretches of the coast. The strikingly beautiful scenery has made this coast a popular vacation destination.
Secondary coast
TYPE
EXTENT
FORMATION
150 miles (240 km)
EXTENT
43 miles (69 km)
Southern side of the Sorrento Peninsula, south of Naples, southern Italy
LOCATION
LOCATION
North of Cairo, northern Egypt
The Nile Delta is one of the world’s largest river deltas. As with all deltas, its shoreline is classed as a primary coast because it formed as a result of sediment deposition from a river, a land-based process. The flow of water that formed it and nourishes it has been reduced significantly by the Aswan Dam in Upper Egypt and by local water usage. The sand belt at the delta’s seaward side, which prevents flooding, is currently eroding, and anticipated future rises in sea level pose a threat to its agriculture, freshwater lagoons, wildlife, and reserves of fresh water.
PROTECTIVE BELT
CLIFFS AT SANT ELIA POSITANO
In this satellite view, the sand belt at the front of the Nile Delta is clearly visible. The protrusions through the sand belt mark the mouths of two Nile tributaries.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Stretching along the southern edge of the Sorrento Peninsula, south of Naples, the Amalfi Coast is famous for its steep cliffs punctuated by caves and grottoes, and for its picturesque coastal towns, some of which are built into the cliffs. The inclined layers of limestone rock that form the cliffs lie at the foot of the Lattari Mountains and were formed between 100 and 70 million years ago.
Primary coast
Deposition of sediment at mouth of River Nile
Marine erosion of folded and inclined limestone rock strata
FORMATION
coasts and the seashore
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ATLANTIC OCEAN SOUTHEAST
Skeleton Coast TYPE
Secondary coast
Windformed desert dunes
FORMATION
310 miles
EXTENT
(500 km) Northwest of Windhoek, on the northwestern coast of Namibia
LOCATION
The Skeleton Coast is an arid coastal wilderness in southwestern Africa, where the Namib Desert meets the South Atlantic. Its northern part is dominated by sand dunes that extend to the sea. Farther south, these are replaced by low gravel plains. An important influence on this largely straight coastline is the Benguela Current, a surface current that flows in a northerly direction offshore, bringing cool waters from the
direction of Antarctica. Prevailing southwesterly winds blow onto the coast from the Atlantic, but as they cross the cold offshore water, any moisture in the air condenses. This leads to an almost permanent fog bank and allows strange desert plants such as Welwitschia mirabilis, a species that survives for hundreds of years, to thrive. The coast is home to a large seal colony at Cape Fria in the north and includes many salt pans.
HUMAN IMPACT
3()072%#+3 4HE3KELETON#OASTISAPTLY NAMED)TSFREQUENTFOGS ONSHORE WINDS ANDPOUNDINGSURFHAVE MADEITAGRAVEYARDFORBOTHSHIPS ANDSAILORS"EHINDTHECOASTISA STEEPMOUNTAINESCARPMENT SO BEFORETHEDAYSOFRESCUEPARTIES THEESCAPEROUTEFORSHIPWRECKED MARINERSWASALONGMARCHALONG THECOASTTHROUGHANARIDDESERT WOODEN SKELETON
This wreck of a wooden vessel is one of many ships that have foundered on this treacherous coast.
HIGH DUNES AND POUNDING SURF
The coast’s high dunes present everchanging contours as they are blown by strong southwesterly winds. Below the dunes, waves pound the beaches.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
INDIAN OCEAN NORTHWEST
Red Sea Coast TYPE
Primary coast
Faulting and sinking of land
FORMATION
1,200 miles (1,900 km)
EXTENT
Coasts of Egypt, Sudan, Eritrea, and Saudi Arabia, from gulfs of Suez and Aqaba to Djibouti
LOCATION
The Red Sea was created as a result of a rifting process that has been gradually separating Africa from the Arabian Peninsula for 25 million years. Rifting is the splitting of a region of Earth’s crust into two parts, which then move apart, creating a new tectonic plate boundary. This process begins when an upward flow of heat
from Earth’s interior stretches the continental crust, causing it to thin, and eventually it may fracture, or fault. Sections of crust may sink, and if either end of the rift connects to the sea, flooding will occur, creating new coasts. On both sides of the Red Sea, there is evidence of the downward movement of blocks of crust, in the form of steep escarpments (lines of mountains). The Red Sea shoreline itself shelves steeply in many parts. On the land side, the coast is sparsely vegetated because of the region’s hot, dry climate, but underwater there are many rich and spectacular coral reefs. SEA MEETS DESERT
The steep Sarawat mountain escarpment that runs the length of the coast can be seen in the distance in this view of the Red Sea coast of the Sinai Peninsula.
coastal landscapes INDIAN OCEAN NORTHWEST
Tigris-Euphrates Delta TYPE
INDIAN OCEAN NORTHEAST
SATELLITE VIEW
The delta’s seaward edge has advanced by about 150 miles (250 km) in the past 3,000 years.
Krabi Coast TYPE
Chemical erosion of limestone followed by drowning
Primary coast
Sediment deposition from Tigris, Euphrates, and Karun
FORMATION
100 miles (160 km)
EXTENT
95 miles
EXTENT
Primary coast
FORMATION
LOCATION
(150 km)
Andaman Sea coast of southwestern
Thailand
Parts of southeastern Iraq, northeastern Kuwait, and southwestern Iran
LOCATION
The area around Krabi on the western coast of southern Thailand is notable for its fantastic-looking formations of partially dissolved limestone, known as karst. This limestone was originally formed about 260 million years ago. At that time, a shallow sea covered what is now south Asia and slowly built up deposits of shells and coral that sediments washed in from the land subsequently buried. These formed layers of limestone, which
The Tigris-Euphrates delta is a broad area of marshes and alluvial plains at the northern head of the Arabian Gulf, formed from sediment deposited by three major rivers. An important haven for wildlife, the delta has undergone substantial change over the past 30 years because of various damming and drainage programs. These changes threaten coastal fisheries and endanger several species of waterfowl and mammals. Some restoration work on the delta began in 2003.
INDIAN OCEAN SOUTHEAST
The Twelve Apostles TYPE
Secondary coast
Wave erosion of cliffs producing large sea stacks
FORMATION
EXTENT
2 miles (3 km)
Near Port Campbell, southwest of Melbourne, Victoria, southeastern Australia
LOCATION
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were later thrust upward and tipped over at an angle when India began to collide with mainland Asia some 50 million years ago. Around Krabi and Phang Nga Bay to its north, chemical erosion of these limestone strata by rainwater, followed by sealevel rise, has created thousands of craggy karst hills and islands. These include a number of isolated coneand cylinder-shaped karst towers that rise out of the sea to heights of up to 700 ft (210 m) and groups of towers that sit on broad masses of limestone. Many of these karst formations are elongated in a northeast–southwest direction, reflecting the axis (or strike line) around which the original layers of limestone were tipped. KOH TAPU ISLAND
Some of the karst formations along this coast have been weathered into unusual shapes, as in these examples at Koh Tapu Island in Phang Nga Bay to the north of Krabi.
One of Australia’s best-known geological landmarks is a group of large sea stacks formed through the erosion of 20-million-year-old limestone cliffs. Known as the Twelve Apostles, even though there were originally only nine of them, the stacks are up to 230 ft (70 m) tall. In 2005, one of the stacks collapsed, leaving just eight. Collapses such as this are quite common and are an integral part of the erosion process.
ONGOING EROSION
The effects of wave erosion can clearly be seen at the bases of the remaining Apostles.
VICTORIA HARBOR
This view shows Victoria Harbor with Hong Kong Island on the left and Kowloon on the right. Visited by more than 200,000 ships per year, the harbor is one of the world’s busiest.
PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Hong Kong Harbor TYPE
Secondary coast
EXTENT
25 miles (40 km)
Southeast of Guangzhou, on the South China Sea coast of southeastern China LOCATION
satellite island, Ap Lei Chau. The margins of all these harbor areas have been artificially modified by the construction of concrete piers, seawalls, jetties, and other structures. This coastline can be classified as a secondary coast because it has been modified by living organisms, in this case, humans. In the whole of the Hong Kong region, more than 60 miles (100 km) of coastline have been artificially constructed or modified.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Artificial coast built around various natural harbors and nearby islands
FORMATION
A number of natural harbors surround Hong Kong Island, which is the bestknown part of the Hong Kong region of China. The largest, naturally deepest, and most sheltered of these harbors is Victoria Harbor, which has an area of over 16 square miles (42 square km) and is situated between Hong Kong Island and Kowloon Peninsula. Other smaller harbors include Aberdeen Harbor, which separates Hong Kong Island from a
THE SKELETON COAST
In this image of Africa’s Skeleton Coast, taken from the Space Shuttle Columbia, a characteristic cloud bank is visible just offshore, formed as water vapor condenses over the cold water of the Benguela Current. From the shoreline, the sand dunes of the Namib Desert extend inland.
102
coasts and the seashore PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Ha Long Bay TYPE
Primary coast
Chemical dissolution and drowning of limestone formations
FORMATION
75 miles
EXTENT
(120 km) On the Gulf of Tonkin, east of Hanoi, Northeastern Vietnam
LOCATION
PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Huon Peninsula TYPE
Primary coast
Uplift of fossil coral reefs as a result of tectonic plate movement
FORMATION
EXTENT
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Ha Long Bay is a distinctive region on the coast of Vietnam, within the Gulf of Tonkin. It consists of a body of water filled with nearly 2,000 islands composed of karst (limestone partially dissolved by rainwater). This landscape, which covers an area of just over 585 square miles (1,500 square km), was created by sea-level rise and flooding of a region with a high concentration of karst towers. Several of the islands are hollow and contain
50 miles (80 km)
Puget Sound TYPE
Primary coast
Glaciercarved coastal channels and bays
FORMATION
90 miles (150 km)
EXTENT
LOCATION
Eastern Papua New Guinea, north of Port Moresby
LOCATION North and south of Seattle, Washington State, northwestern US
For hundreds of thousands of years, the Huon Peninsula has been forced upward at a rate of about 10 in (25 cm) per century by movements of Earth’s crust at a tectonic plate boundary. This activity has pushed coastal coral reefs above the shoreline to form a series of terraced reefs on land. The oldest of these are hundreds of yards back from the coast. By studying them, scientists have learned much about changes in sea level and climate over the past 250,000 years.
Puget Sound, with its numerous channels and branches, was created primarily by glaciers. About 20,000 years ago, a glacier from present-day
AERIAL VIEW OF THE PENINSULA
huge caves, and a few have been given distinctive names, such as Ga Choi (“Fighting Cocks”) Island, Man’s Head Island, and the Incense Burner, as a result of their unusual shapes. Most are uninhabited. The Bay’s shallow waters are biologically highly productive and sustain hundreds of species of fish, mollusks, crustaceans, and other invertebrates, including corals. Designated a World Heritage Site in 1998, Ha Long Bay is currently
Canada advanced over the area, covering it in thick ice. Over the next 7,000 years, glaciers advanced and retreated several times. When they finally withdrew, they left behind many deeply gouged channels and thick layers of mud, sand, and gravel deposited by meltwater. Waves and weather have since reworked the deposits, molding landforms and shoreline, and forming beaches, bluffs, spits, and other sedimentary features. SOUND SETTLEMENTS
Much of the shoreline around Puget Sound has now been settled. The town of Tacoma is seen here, with Mount Rainier in the distance.
under threat from water pollution as a result of mining activities, environmental degradation from urban development nearby, destruction of mangroves, and the removal of corals from reefs for sale to tourists. TOWERING LIMESTONE
Several large karst islands, each topped with thick tropical vegetation, tower over a central area of Ha Long Bay. These islands rise up to 660 ft (200 m) above sea level.
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coastal landscapes PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Big Sur TYPE
Intermediate coast
Tectonic uplift combined with rapid wave erosion
FORMATION
90 miles
EXTENT
(145 km) Southeast of San Francisco, coast of California, US
LOCATION
The Big Sur coastline of central California, where the rugged Santa Lucia Mountains descend steeply into the Pacific Ocean, is one of the most spectacular in the US. Like much of the west coast of North America, Big Sur is an emergent shoreline, in that the coast has risen up faster than sea level
PACIFIC OCEAN SOUTHEAST
Chilean Fjordlands TYPE
Primary coast
Deep glacier-carved valleys flooded by sea-level rise
FORMATION
950 miles (1,500 km)
EXTENT
Pacific coast of southern Chile from Puerto Montt to Punta Arenas
LOCATION
since the end of the last ice age. This uplift has resulted from interactions at the nearby boundary between the Pacific and North American tectonic plates—this region is crisscrossed by a complex system of faults in Earth’s crust and is subjected to frequent earthquakes. At Big Sur a combination of tectonic uplift and relentless wave erosion has produced steep cliffs and partially formed marine terraces (platforms cut at the base of cliffs by waves and then lifted up). The coast is susceptible to landslides as a result of wave action, the weakening of the cliffs by faulting and fracturing, the destruction of vegetation by summer fires, and heavy winter rainfall.
PACIFIC OCEAN CENTRAL
Hawaiian Lava Coast TYPE
Primary coast
Lava flow into the sea from an active volcano
FORMATION
EXTENT
14 miles (20 km)
LOCATION Southeastern coast of the Big Island of Hawaii, US
One of the fastest ways for a coast to change shape is as a result of lava flow to the sea. On southeastern Big Island, new coast has been added intermittently since 1969 as a result of lava flows
103
from satellite craters of the active volcano Kilauea. Lava from the Pu’u O’o crater flows some 9 miles (15 km) to the sea, where it cools and hardens to form land. This coastal landscape is a primitive scene of black beaches and dark cliffs made of rough, fractured lava. Plants begin to colonize newly formed areas of the coast within months of their formation. STEAM PLUMES
As red-hot lava enters the sea, it solidifies amid huge plumes of steam. Newly forming shoreline sometimes collapses to reveal ripped-open lava tubes.
RAISED PLATFORM
In this view of part of Big Sur, a grassed-over marine terrace (the green area) is visible above the present-day cliff, with a raised ancient cliff behind it.
The Chilean fjordlands are a labyrinth of fjords, islands, inlets, straits, and twisting peninsulas, lying to the west of the snow-capped peaks of the southern Andes. The fjordlands extend for most of the length of southern Chile, as far south as Tierra del Fuego, and their total area is some 21,500 square miles (55,000 square km). Some 10,000 years ago, this region was covered in glaciers, but these have largely retreated into large ice-filled
areas within the mountains on the Chile–Argentina border called the Northern and Southern Patagonian Ice Fields. The glaciers left behind a network of long, deeply gouged valleys, which were filled by glacier meltwater and then flooded by the sea to form today’s fjords. Rainfall here is heavy, and clear skies are rare because the moisture-laden Pacific air cools and forms clouds as
it rises to cross the Andes. On the edges of the fjords, waterfalls cascade down steep granite walls, while hundreds of species of birds nest and feed around the often mist-shrouded coast and islands. Mammals that live along this coast include sea lions, elephant seals, and marine otters.
ICE-CHOKED FJORD
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
The calving ends of outlet glaciers, which choke the waters with icebergs, are found at the landward end of some fjords.
BATTERED BY THE SEA
The Eastern Scheldt storm-surge barrier in the Netherlands is one of the world’s largest sea defenses. Its 62 sliding steel gates are held between concrete piers.
105
coastal defenses
In 2000, the US Federal Emergency Management Agency estimated that as many as 87,000 houses in the US are in danger of falling into the sea by the year 2060. Among them are the condemned houses, pictured below, on eroding cliffs at Governors Run in Chesapeake Bay, Maryland. In California, about 86 percent of the coast is actively eroding. Similarly, stretches of the eastern coast of England are eroding at a rate of up to 6 ft (1.8 m) a year—the highest rate in Europe. Coastal defenses can slow coastal erosion temporarily, but in the long run maintenance will become prohibitively expensive. In the end, the sea will triumph.
HARD ENGINEERING
SEA WALL A sea wall is designed to reflect wave energy. Modern walls have a curved top that prevents water from spraying over the wall in storms. A wall protects the land behind it for some years but usually increases erosion of the beach in front of it.
ROCK GROYNE This consists of a pile of large rocks built out from the shore. The aim is to slow erosion by causing a local buildup of sand, but it can aggravate erosion nearby.
SOFT ENGINEERING
DUNE STABILIZATION Coastal dunes provide valuable protection against erosion if they can be stabilized and prevented from shifting. This is usually achieved by planting with grasses.
MODERN SOLUTION
CRUMBLING COASTS
TYPES OF DEFENSES
BEACH NOURISHMENT This involves adding large amounts of sand to a beach. Waves and tides spread the material along the coast, temporarily building up its natural defenses.
GEOTUBE A geotube is a long, cylindrical container, over 8 ft (2.3 m) in diameter, made of a durable textile or plastic and filled with a slurry of sand and water. Different types can be laid along the top of a beach, or inside a dune, or just offshore, where they reduce coastal erosion and protect beachfronts. This tube is part of the Barren Island Tidal Wetland project in Maryland.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
DAMS AND STORM-SURGE BARRIERS The Netherlands has invested in an extensive series of engineering works to protect a large region of the country from future marine flooding. Known as the Deltaworks, it includes many dams and movable stormsurge barriers. The works were initiated in 1953 after a serious storm and floods killed a total of 1,835 people.
LARGE-SCALE PROTECTION
Coastal defense refers to various types of engineering techniques aimed at protecting coasts from the sea. The threats posed by the sea fall into two main categories. First is the danger of flooding of low-lying coastal areas during severe storms. Second is the continuous gradual erosion of some coasts. There are a number of different approaches to coastal defense. To prevent flooding of low-lying regions, one solution is to build a large-scale system of dams and tidal barriers. Another is to encourage the development of natural barriers, such as salt marshes, around coasts, and to conserve existing areas of this type. A third possibility is managed retreat. Instead of trying to hold back the sea, some areas of coast are allowed to flood. The idea is that, in time, the flooded land will turn into a marsh, providing natural protection. To slow coastal erosion, various “hard” engineering techniques are commonly employed, such as the building of sea walls, breakwaters, or groynes. These methods can be effective for a while (they usually have to be rebuilt after a few decades), but are expensive and can increase erosion on neighboring areas of coast by interfering with longshore movement of sediment. “Soft” engineering techniques are more environmentally friendly. They include the temporary solution of beach nourishment (see panel, right), which has to be repeated every few years, and encouraging the development of coastal dunes.
106
coasts and the seashore
BEACHES AND DUNES BEACHES ARE DEPOSITS OF SEDIMENTARY MATERIAL, ranging in size from fine sand to rocks, that commonly occur on coasts above the low-tide line. Sources of beach material include sediment brought to a coast by rivers, or eroded from cliffs or the sea floor, or biological material such as shells. This material is continually moved on and off shore and around coasts, by waves and tides. Wind can also influence beach development and is instrumental in forming coastal dunes.
DISSIPATIVE BEACH AND DUNE
Dissipative beaches are usually made up of fine sand, and they slope at an angle of less than 5˚.
BEACH ANATOMY
TYPES OF BEACHES
A typical beach has several zones. The foreshore is the area between the average high- and low-tide lines. On the seaward side of the foreshore is the nearshore, while behind it is the backshore; the latter is submerged only during the very highest tides and usually includes a flat-topped accumulation of beach material called a berm. The sloping area seaward of the berm, making up most of the foreshore, is the beach face. At the top end of the beach face there are sometimes a series of crescentshaped troughs, called beach cusps. The swash zone is the part of the beach face that is alternately covered and uncovered with water as each wave arrives. Seaward of the swash zone, extending out to where the waves break, is the surf zone. The shape of a beach often alters as wave energy changes over the year.
The level of wave energy, the direction the waves arrive from, and the geological makeup of a coast all affect the type of beach that will form. Dissipative beaches are gently sloping and absorb wave energy over a broad area, while reflective beaches are steeper and shorter, and consist of coarser sediment. If a cliffed coast contains a mixture of both easily eroded and erosion-resistant rock, headlands tend to form, with crescent-shaped beaches within the bays (embayed beaches) or smaller “pocket” beaches. Both of these tend to be “swash-aligned”—the waves arrive parallel to shore and do not transport sediment along the beach. Many long, straight beaches are “driftaligned”—the waves nd arrive at an angle and inla direction of ma longshore drift sediment is moved sand along the beach by embayed beach spit longshore drift.
SWASH
The surge of water and sediment up a beach when a wave arrives is called swash. If waves reach a beach at an angle, the combined effect of swash and backwash moves material along the beach.
This imaginary coast (right) shows several beach types, ranging from a tombolo (a sand deposit between the mainland and an island) to a drift-aligned beach.
pocket beach tombolo
predominant direction of wind and waves
BEACH PARTS AND ZONES
BACKSHORE
FORESHORE
NEARSHORE
long driftaligned beach
swash-aligned beach
RANGE OF BEACHES
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
This photograph (left) shows the main zones on a beach and the locations of the berm, beach face, and beach cusps. It was taken when the sea was approaching low tide.
average low-tide line
average high-tide line surf zone
swash zone
beach face
beach cusp
berm
foredune
berm crest
107
pebbles or medium gravel 3/8 – 1/2 in (8 mm–1.5 cm) in diameter
very fine gravel 1/16 – 1/8 in (2–4 mm) in diameter
very coarse sand 1/32 – 1/16 in (1–2 mm) in diameter
BEACH COMPOSITION
PEBBLES AND SHELLS
The composition of a beach at any particular location depends on the material available and on the energy of the arriving waves. Most beaches are composed of sand, gravel, or pebbles produced from rock erosion. Sand consists of grains of quartz and other minerals, such as feldspar and olivine, typically derived from igneous rocks such as granite and basalt. Other common beachforming materials, seen particularly in the tropics, include the fragmented shells and skeletons of marine organisms. In general, higher wave energies are associated with coarser beach material, such as gravel or pebbles, rather than fine sand. Occasionally, large boulders are found on beaches—usually they have rolled down to the shore from local cliffs, but some boulders have ended up on beaches as a result of glacial transport or even backwash from tsunamis.
This high-energy beach (left) contains many large pebbles. Mollusk shells in the beach below reflect favorable offshore feeding conditions for the live mollusks.
COASTAL DUNES
medium sand 1/100 – 1/50 in (0.25–0.5 mm) in diameter
fine sand 1/200 – 1/100 in (0.125–0.25 mm) in diameter coarse silt 1/850 – 1/400 in (0.03–0.06 mm) in diameter
GRAIN SIZES
The silts, sands, and gravels that make up most beaches tend to become sorted by the action of waves, with material of different sizes deposited on different parts of the beach.
MARRAM GRASS
This grass is a common colonizer of embryo dunes. It develops deep roots that allow it to tap into deep groundwater stores. The roots bind the sand together, while the grass traps more blown sand, assisting in foredune development.
Coastal dunes are formed by wind blowing sand off the dry parts of a beach. Dunes develop in the area behind the backshore, which together with the upper beach face supplies the sand. For dunes to develop, this sand has to be continually replaced on the beach by wave action. The actual movement of sand to form dunes occurs through a jumping and bouncing motion along the ground called saltation. Some coastal areas have more than one set of vegetated dunes that run parallel to the shoreline. The dunes closest to shore are called foredunes; behind them is a primary dune ridge, secondary dune ridge, and so on. These anchored, vegetated dunes are important for the protection they provide against coastal erosion. On some coasts, non-vegetated, mobile dunes occur; these move in response to the prevailing winds. They can often be anchored by planting with grasses.
This beach in the Seychelles is an example of a reflective beach because of its quite steeply shelving face. It has a distinct berm and berm crest.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
REFLECTIVE BEACH
108
coasts and the seashore ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
ATLANTIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Pink Sands Beach
Copacabana Beach
TYPE
Dissipative beach, protected by reefs
TYPE Embayed, dissipative beach
Sand mixed with broken shells and skeletons
COMPOSITION
COMPOSITION
LENGTH
White
sand LENGTH
21/2 miles (4 km)
3 miles (5 km)
Harbour Island, off Eleuthera, northeast of Nassau, Northern Bahamas
LOCATION
LOCATION
Rio de Janeiro, southeastern Brazil
One of the most famous beaches in the world, Copacabana Beach is a wide, gently curving stretch of sand between two headlands. Behind the beach lies the city of Rio de Janeiro, with green, luxuriant hills in the hinterland. The beach is crowded much of the year and is known for its beach sports and New Year’s Eve firework displays. The sea area off the beach is not always recommended for swimming, due to strong currents.
Pink Sands in the Bahamas is a gently sloping beach that faces east onto the Atlantic Ocean. It is protected from ocean currents by an outlying reef. The pale pink color of the sand comes from small, singlecelled organisms called foraminiferans, in particular, the species Homotrema rubrum, also known as the sea strawberry. The shells of these organisms are bright red or pink due to the presence of an iron salt. In parts of the Bahamas they are abundant, living on the underside of reefs. When they die, they fall to the seafloor, where they are broken by wave action and mixed with other debris, such as the white shells of snails and sea urchins, as well as mineral grains. This mixture is then finely pulverized and washed up on the shore as pinkcolored sand by wave action. GENTLE SLOPE
Pink Sands is an example of a dissipative beach, on which waves break some distance from the shore, then slowly roll in, dissipating their energy across a broad surf zone.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
St. Ninian’s Tombolo TYPE
Tombolo COMPOSITION
Yellow and white sand LENGTH 3/ 5
mile (1 km)
West coast of southern Mainland, the main island of the Shetland Isles, off Scotland, UK
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LOCATION
NARROW CONNECTION
A slim, sandy tombolo extends from the Shetland island of Mainland in the foreground, to St. Ninian’s Isle.
COPACABANA LOOKING NORTH
St. Ninian’s Isle in the Shetland Isles provides a classic example of a tombolo, or ayre—a short spit of sedimentary material that connects an island to a nearby land mass or mainland. A tombolo is formed by waves curving around the back of an island so that they deposit sediment on a neighboring land mass, at the point directly opposite the island. Over time, these sediments gradually build up into a tombolo, which
typically projects at right angles to the coast and has a beach on each side. St. Ninian’s Tombolo has been in existence for at least 1,000 years, and its permanence may be due to a cobble base underlying the sand. This tombolo tends to become lower and narrower during storms as a result of destructive wave action, while during calmer weather the waves build it up again with sand carried from offshore or the nearshore. The sediment that
forms a tombolo may come from the mainland, the island, the sea floor, or a combination. Scientists have deduced that a tombolo will usually form when the ratio between an island’s distance from shore and its length parallel to the shore is less than 1:5 (for St. Ninian’s Isle this ratio is less than 1). If the ratio is greater than 1:5, a feature called a salient may form— a sand spit that reaches toward the island but does not quite reach it.
109 ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
North Jutland Dunes TYPE
Coastal dunes
Yellow sand, marram grass COMPOSITION LENGTH
155 miles
(250 km) LOCATION
North and northwest coast of Jutland,
Denmark
Much of the northern coastline of Denmark’s Jutland Peninsula consists of sand dunes, which cover several thousand square miles of coast. These dunes are “active” in that they have a natural tendency to migrate along the
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Porthcurno Beach TYPE
Pocket beach
Yellowwhite sand, composed mainly of shell fragments COMPOSITION
LENGTH
500 ft (150 m)
Southwest of Penzance, Cornwall, southwestern England, UK
LOCATION
Porthcurno is a typical pocket beach located near Land’s End at England’s southwesternmost tip. Like all pocket beaches, it nestles between two headlands that protect the sandy cove from erosion by winter storms and strong currents. Pocket beaches are
coast, carried by wind (sand drift) and wave erosion. In some areas, attempts have been made to restrict this dune drift, to prevent sand from inundating summer houses. Some early attempts were fruitless. For example, sand fences were built into the dunes during World War II, but the dunes have since moved behind them, leaving the fences on the beach. More recently, many dune areas have been stabilized more successfully by planting with grasses and conifer trees. SHIFTING SANDS
Many sand dunes on the peninsula have marram grass growing in them, which helps constrain their movement.
common where cliffs made of different types of rock are subject to strong wave action. Rock that is especially hard and resistant to erosion forms headlands, while intervening areas of softer rock are worn down to form pocket beaches. Unlike other beaches, pocket beaches exchange little or no sand or other sediment with the adjacent shoreline, because the headlands prevent longshore drift. The sea at Porthcurno is a distinctive turquoise, possibly due to the reflective qualities of the sand, which is made mainly of shell fragments.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Chesil Beach TYPE Storm beach on tombolo COMPOSITION
CHESIL BANK
The bank is about 650 ft (200 m) wide and 50 ft (15 m) high along its entire length. The beach (left) is on its seaward side.
Gravel of
flint and chert LENGTH LOCATION
18 miles (29 km)
West of Weymouth, Dorset, southern
England
Chesil Beach forms the seaward side of the Chesil Bank, a remarkably long, narrow bank of sedimentary material that connects the coast of Dorset in southern England to the Isle of Portland. Behind the bank is a tidal lagoon called the Fleet. Running parallel to the coast, Chesil Bank looks like a barrier island. However, because it connects the mainland to an island, it is classified as a tombolo. How Chesil Bank and its beach originally formed is debated—the most widely accepted theory is that it originally formed offshore and was then gradually moved to its current location by waves and tides. The beach is classified as a storm beach, as it is affected by strong waves because it faces southwest toward the Atlantic and the prevailing winds. Like most storm beaches, it is steep, with a gradient of up to 45 degrees, and is made of gravel.
GRANITE HEADLANDS
The headlands on either side of the beach are formed from 300million-year-old granite. DISCOVERY
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OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
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110 ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Cap Ferret
ATLANTIC OCEAN EAST
Banc d’Arguin TYPE
Coastal dunes on
TYPE Coastal dunes and tidal flats
a spit COMPOSITION Sand, grasses, forest LENGTH
COMPOSITION
Yellow
sand
71/2 miles (12 km)
LENGTH
100 miles
(160 km) LOCATION
Coast of Aquitaine, southwest of Bordeaux, southwestern France
LOCATION Between Nouakchott and Nouadhibou on the northwest coast of Mauritania, West Africa
Cap Ferret lies at the southern end of a long sand spit in western France. It separates the Arcachon Lagoon from the Atlantic Ocean and forms part of the spectacular Aquitaine coast, which at 143 miles (230 km) is the longest sandy coast in Europe. This region is characterized by a series of straight, sandy beaches backed by longitudinal sand dunes, which are the highest dune formations in Europe. They include the highest individual European sand dune, the Dune du Pilat, which rises to about 380 ft (115 m) above sea level. Behind the main dune area is a forest, originally planted in the 18th century to try to prevent the dunes from shifting. Unfortunately, this coast is undergoing serious erosion, of more than 33 ft (10 m) a year in some places, mainly because excessive urban development has degraded the vegetation cover.
The Banc d’Arguin National Park is a vast region of dunes, islands, and shallow tidal flats covering more than 4,600 square miles (12,000 square km) of the Mauritanian coast. The dunes, which consist mainly of windblown sand from the Sahara, are concentrated in the southern region of the Park. Banc d’Arguin contains a variety of plant life and is a major breeding or wintering site for many migratory birds, including flamingos, pelicans, and terns. It was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987.
SAND MOUNTAINS
INDIAN OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Jeffreys Bay TYPE Series of gently sloping, dissipative beaches COMPOSITION LENGTH
Sand
15 miles (24 km)
Southwest of Port Elizabeth, eastern Cape Province, South Africa
LOCATION
Jeffreys Bay is famous both as a highly popular surfing spot and for the large numbers of beautiful seashells that wash up on its shores. It consists of a series of wide beaches strung out along a southeast-facing stretch of the South African coastline. As a surfing destination, Jeffreys Bay is regularly ranked among the top five beaches in the world by those seeking the “perfect wave.” The most acclaimed surfing spot or wave “break”
Along the coast to the north and south of Cap Ferret, mini-mountains of pale, rippling sand are backed by an extensive vegetation cover.
SAND BANKS AT BANC D’ARGUIN
is known as Supertubes. Here, the combination of shoreline shape, bottom topography, and direction of wave propagation regularly generates waves that form huge, glassy-looking hollow tubes as they break. Other nearby wave breaks in Jeffreys Bay have been given such colorful names as Boneyards, Magna Tubes, and Kitchen Windows. Some of these waves can carry a skilled surfer several hundred yards along the beach on
a single ride. The same waves that attract surfers are also responsible for the vast numbers and wide variety of seashells that are washed up onto the beach with each tide. Conchologists have identified the shells of over 400 species of marine animals, including various gastropods, chitons, and bivalves, making the bay the most biologically diverse natural coastline in South Africa. Dolphins, whales, and seals are also seen. HUMAN IMPACT
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
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HEADING FOR SUPERTUBES
The waves at Supertubes may be 10 ft (3 m) high and invariably break rightto-left as viewed from the shore.
%VERYSURFINGSPOT INCLUDING *EFFREYS"AY HASDANGERSTHAT WOULD BESURFERSSHOULDKNOW ABOUT4HEMOSTIMPORTANT ARERIPCURRENTS4HEENORMOUS VOLUMEOFSEAWATERWASHEDUPON SHOREBYTHEWAVESTENDSTOPOOL ATSPECIFICPOINTSONTHEBEACH ANDISTHENFUNNELEDBACKOUTTO SEAINSWIFTCURRENTS4HESEMOVE RAPIDLYAWAYFROMTHEBEACH STRAIGHTOUTTHROUGHTHESURF ZONE ANDCANSWEEPUNSUSPECTING SWIMMERSOUTTOSEA4HEYCANBE ESCAPEDBYSWIMMINGPARALLELTO THESHORE!T*EFFREYS"AY THERE HAVEALSOBEENRAREREPORTSOF SURFERSBEINGBITTENBYSHARKS MOSTOFTENBYTHESANDTIGEROR RAGGED TOOTHSHARK
beaches and dunes INDIAN OCEAN NORTH
INDIAN OCEAN NORTH
Anjuna Beach
Cox’s Bazar
Series of embayed and pocket beaches
TYPE Dissipative coastal plain beach
TYPE
COMPOSITION
Yellow
COMPOSITION
sand LENGTH
111
Yellow
sand 11/2 miles
LENGTH
(2.5 km)
75 miles
(120 km)
LOCATION
On the Arabian Sea coast, northwest of Panaji, southwestern India
LOCATION South of Chittagong, southeastern Bangladesh
Anjuna Beach is one of the most scenic and popular of the renowned string of beaches that lie on the coast of the Indian State of Goa. The beach has an undulating shape and is broken up into several sections by rocky outcrops that jut into the sea. By reducing rip currents and crosscurrents, these outcrops help to make Anjuna one of the safest swimming beaches on the Goa coast. During the monsoon season, from June to September, much of the beach sand is stripped away and carried offshore by heavy wave action, but after the monsoons, calmer seas restore the sand deposits.
Cox’s Bazar lies on a northeastern stretch of the Bay of Bengal and is the second-longest unbroken natural beach in the world—Ninety Mile Beach (see p.112) in Australia is the longest. It fronts a range of dunes and, at its southern end, a spit of land. The dunes, spit, and beach have been built up over hundreds of years through a combination of wave action and deposition of sediment from the Bay of Bengal. This is a gently sloping beach that offers safe swimming and surfing and is also popular among collectors of conch shells.
PICTURESQUE SETTING
With its calm seas and sand crescents backed by swaying palms and low, rocky hills, Anjuna has been a favored vacation destination since the 1960s.
SATELLITE VIEW OF COX’S BAZAR
INDIAN OCEAN SOUTHEAST
Shell Beach TYPE
Embayed beach
Shells of a species of cockle COMPOSITION
LENGTH 70 miles (110 km) LOCATION
Northwest of Perth, Western Australia
SHELL BANK
Individual shells in the beach are about ½ in (1 cm) wide. Accumulations of these shells over about 4,000 years has led to the formation of a long bank along the seashore.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Shell Beach, in Western Australia’s Shark Bay, has a unique composition, consisting almost entirely of the white shells of Fragum erugatum, a species of cockle (a bivalve). The beach lies in a partially enclosed area of Shark Bay known as L’Haridon Bight. This cockle thrives here because its predators cannot cope with the high salinity of the seawater. On the foreshore of Shell Beach, the layer of shells reaches a depth of 26–30 ft (8–9 m) and also forms the sea floor, stretching for hundreds of yards from the shoreline. On the upper parts of the beach, away from the water line, many of the shells have become cemented together, in some areas leading to the formation of large, solid conglomerations. These are mined to make decorative wall blocks.
112
coasts and the seashore PACIFIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Ninety Mile Beach TYPE Dissipative coastal plain beach COMPOSITION
Yellow
sand LENGTH
94 miles
(151 km) Southeast of Melbourne, Victoria, southeastern Australia,
LOCATION
Australia’s Ninety Mile Beach, on the coast of Victoria, has a solid claim to be the world’s longest uninterrupted natural beach. The beach runs in a southwest to northeasterly direction
and fronts a series of dunes. Waves generally break too close to the beach for good surfing, and strong rip currents make the conditions hazardous for swimmers. In its northeastern part, several large lakes and shallow lagoons, known as the Gippsland Lakes, lie behind the dunes. Beneath the sea, vast plains of sand stretch in every direction and are home to a large variety of small invertebrate life, including crustaceans, worms, and burrowing mollusks. AERIAL VIEW
Facing out onto the Bass Strait, Ninety Mile Beach is subject to strong waves during the winter months.
PACIFIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
PACIFIC OCEAN CENTRAL
Moeraki Beach TYPE
Punalu’u Beach
Embayed beach
COMPOSITION
TYPE
Pocket beach
Dark
sand and large boulders LENGTH
COMPOSITION
Black sand
5 miles (8 km)
LENGTH 3/ 5
Northeast of Dunedin, southeastern New Zealand
Northeast of Naalehu, Big Island, southeastern Hawaii
The beach north of Moeraki on New Zealand’s South Island is strewn with large, near-spherical boulders. Their origin is unclear, but the most widely accepted scientific view is that they are mineral concretions that formed 60 million years ago in mudstones—layers of softer sedimentary rock on the sea floor. These mudstones were later uplifted and now form a cliff at the back of the beach. There, gradual erosion exposes and releases the boulders, which eventually roll down onto the beach.
Punalu’u Beach on Hawaii’s Big Island is a steeply shelving pocket beach. It is best known for its dramatic-looking black sand, which is composed of grains of the volcanic rock basalt. The sand has been produced by wave action on local cliffs of black basaltic lava. Punalu’u, in common with about half the land area of Hawaii, lies on the flank of Mauna Loa, the world’s most massive volcano. Lava produced by the volcano dominates the local landscape—although no lava has reached Punalu’u from Mauna Loa or the nearby active volcano Kilauea for several hundred years. The beach is a popular location for swimming and snorkeling, but underwater springs that eject cold water into the sea close to the beach can cause discomfort. Punalu’u Beach is also visited by green turtles, which come to eat seaweed off rocks at the edge of the beach and bask on the warm, heat-absorbing sand.
SUPERSIZED BOULDERS
The boulders are up to 10 ft (3 m) in diameter and some weigh several tons. Some are halfburied in the sand.
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Columbia Bay OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
TYPE Series of embayed beaches COMPOSITION
Gravel
and rocks LENGTH
location by ancient glaciers, remaining there when the glaciers melted. The till has usually been reworked by wave action, with the lighter material (clay, silt, and sand) washed away and the heavier gravel and rocks sorted by size and deposited in different areas along
mile (1 km)
LOCATION
the shoreline. Such is the case in Columbia Bay, a region within Alaska’s Prince William Sound. Many of the beaches in this area have old tidal lines visible above the present ones, the result of a huge earthquake in 1964 that raised the land by 8 ft (2.4 m).
LOCATION
31 miles (50 km)
Southwest of Valdez, southern Alaska, US
LOCATION
Many beaches in southern Alaska, and other beaches at high latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere, consist of gravel, small rocks, and boulders. These materials come from coarse glacial till—mixtures of clay, silt, sand, gravel, and rocks that were carried to a BEACH AND BAY
BLACK AND BLUE
The backshore area visible here, which has been colonized by plants, was foreshore prior to the 1964 earthquake.
The sand on Punalu’u is almost perfectly black, contrasting with the deep blue Pacific waters. Removal of the sand is prohibited.
beaches and dunes PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Oregon National Dunes TYPE
Coastal dunes
Yellow sand, grasses, conifers COMPOSITION LENGTH
40 miles
(64 km) Southwest of Portland, Oregon, northwestern US
LOCATION
Oregon National Dunes is the largest area of coastal sand dunes in North America, extending along the coast of Oregon between the Sislaw and Coos rivers. These dunes have been created through the combined effects of coastal erosion and wind transport of sand over millions of years and extend up to 21/2 miles (4 km) inland, rising to 500 ft (150 m) above sea level. A continuum of dry and wet conditions extends through the dune area. Close to the beach are low foredunes of sand and driftwood
stabilized by marram grass. Behind these are hummocks where sand collects around vegetation. Water accumulates around the hummocks seasonally, giving them the appearance of floating islands. Behind the hummocks are further distinct regions, ranging from densely vegetated areas that become marshlike in winter to completely barren, wind-sculpted high dunes. The dunes are a popular location for various recreational activities, including riding all-terrain vehicles (ATVs) and dune buggies.
113
HUMAN IMPACT
$5.% $%34!"),):!4)/. 4HEUSEOFDUNEBUGGIESAND !46S ESPECIALLYWHENRACEDIN LARGENUMBERS MAYDESTROYTHE GRASSONTHEDUNES MAKINGTHEM SUSCEPTIBLETOWINDSCOUR4HIS MAYINTURNLEADTOSELF PROPAGATINGBREACHESINTHEDUNE RIDGES4OPROTECTTHEDUNES !46USAGEISRESTRICTED
SEA OF DUNES
The wind molds the sand of the dunes into wave shapes, with crests at right angles to the wind direction.
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Dungeness Spit TYPE
Sand spit COMPOSITION
Sand LENGTH
51/2 miles (9 km) Northwest of Seattle, Washington State, northwestern US
LOCATION
Dungeness Spit, thought to be the world’s longest natural sand spit, juts out from the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State. It is part of the
Dungeness National Wildlife Refuge and is as little as 50 ft (15 m) wide in places. In addition to its great length, the spit has a complex shape, the result of seasonal changes in wind and wave direction. During part of the year, these bring sandy sediments from the northwest, and at other times from the northeast. The resulting pattern of sedimentation has created a large sheltered coastal area, providing refuge for many shorebirds and waterfowl, which nest along the beach, and for Pacific harbor seals. The tidal flats nourish a variety of shellfish, and the inner bay is an important nursery habitat for several salmon species.
Tamarindo Beach TYPE
COASTAL SETTING
In this view, the main part of Tamarindo Beach is in the background, with the entrance to an estuary that curves around behind the beach on the right.
Embayed beach COMPOSITION
Yellow sand LENGTH
2 miles (3 km) LOCATION
Northwest of San José, northwestern
Costa Rica
GROWING SPIT
The spit grows at about 15 ft (4.5 m) a year. It provides shelter for a large inner bay and an area of tidal flats.
Tamarindo Beach is a curved, gently shelving crescent of sand situated between two mangrove-lined estuaries and backed by dry tropical forest.
It faces directly onto the Pacific, with its enormous fetch (wave-generation area), and so benefits from a strong year-round incoming swell, making the beach a popular surfing location. To the north and south of the main beach are two further beaches that together form the Las Baulas National Marine Park. These are important nesting sites for the leatherback turtle from October to March.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
PACIFIC OCEAN EAST
114
coasts and the seashore
ESTUARIES AND LAGOONS ESTUARIES AND COASTAL LAGOONS ARE BOTH semi-enclosed, coastal bodies of water. An estuary typically connects to the open sea, is quite narrow, and receives a significant input of fresh water from one or more rivers. This fresh water mixes with the salt water to a varying degree, depending on river input and tides. Many estuaries are simply the seaward, tidally affected ends of large rivers. Coastal lagoons are usually linked to the sea only by one or more narrow channels, through which water flows in and out; sometimes these channels open only at high tide.
ESTUARY FORMATION Estuaries form in four main ways. For example, the sea level may rise and flood an existing river valley on a coastal plain, such as in Chesapeake Bay in the US. Alternatively, the sea level can rise to flood a glacier-carved valley, forming a fjord. Estuaries formed in this way are deeper than other types, but have shallow sills at their mouths that partially block inflowing seawater. Coastal wave action can also create an estuary, by river building a sand spit or bar across the open end of a bay fed by a stream or river (see p.93). Other estuaries result from movement at tectonic faults (lines of weakness) in Earth’s crust, where downward slippage can result in a surface depression. This becomes an DROWNED RIVER SYSTEM estuary if seawater later retreating glacier-carved glacier valley floods in.
estuary
delta
sill
FORMATION PROCESSES
CONGO RIVER ESTUARY
Formed by flooding of a river valley, this estuary is the world’s second largest (after the Amazon) in terms of discharge rate.
An estuary can form when sea-level rise causes the seaward end of a river valley to flood (top) or inundates a glaciercarved valley to create a fjord (middle), or when a spit extends across a bay (bottom).
debris left by glacier (moraine)
estuary (fjord)
FLOODED GLACIAL VALLEY sand spit bay bay river longshore current SPIT ACROSS A BAY
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
TYPES OF ESTUARIES The way in which fresh and salt water mixes in an estuary determines its classification. A strong river inflow usually means minimal mixing—the less-dense fresh water flows over the denser salt water, which forms a wedge-shaped intrusion into the bottom of the estuary. This is a saltwedge (river-dominated) estuary. In partially mixed and fully mixed (tide-dominated) estuaries, there is considerable mixing, producing turbulence and increased salinity in the fresh water. In each case, this is balanced by a strong, tidally influenced influx of salt water from the sea: this influx brings sediments from offshore, which are deposited as mud in the estuary. medium flow of fresh water
minimal mixing of salt and fresh water
strong flow of fresh water
SALT-WEDGE ESTUARY
In a salt-wedge estuary (left), there is a strong flow of fresh river water over a wedge of salt water, with little mixing between the two layers.
fresh water
wedge of sea water
horizontal variation in salinity weak flow of fresh water
outflow to sea
slightly salty water flows out
small tidal countercurrent outflow to sea large tidal countercurrent
fresh water
considerable mixing
PARTIALLY MIXED ESTUARY
large tidal countercurrent
In this type of estuary, there is considerable mixing between fresh and salt water. The saltiness of the water increases with depth in all parts of the lower estuary.
thorough vertical mixing
salt water
FULLY MIXED ESTUARY
In a fully mixed (or tide-dominated) estuary, the fresh and salt water are well-mixed vertically, but there is some horizontal variation in saltiness.
estuaries and lagoons CARVED BY GLACIERS
A fjord is an estuary formed when the sea floods a deep valley originally carved out by a glacier. Norway’s Geiranger Fjord is 12 miles (20 km) long, and reaches a depth of 660 ft (200 m).
115
ESTUARINE ENVIRONMENTS Estuaries are unique coastal environments. They are typically long and funnel-shaped, so tides don’t just rise here—they rush in, creating strong currents and, sometimes, wall-like waves called tidal bores. The high COMMON EUROPEAN OYSTER rate of sedimentation means that mud accumulates, so tidal mudflats and salt marshes (see pp.124–25) or in the tropics, mangrove swamps (see pp.130–31), develop. Despite the effects of tides and currents, the high turbidity that reduces plant photosynthesis, and fluctuations in salinity and temperature, most estuaries are biologically highly productive. This is partly due to the high concentration of nutrients in river water, and because estuaries are well oxygenated. Although only a limited range of organisms, such as mussels, cope with living in estuaries, populations are often huge.
RICH FOOD SOURCE
ESTUARY DWELLER
Estuaries attract waders and other shorebirds because of the high concentrations of small animals (such as worms and shrimp) that live in the mud deposits. These lapwings and an egret are congregating to feed in the Thames estuary, UK.
Various species of starfish tolerate the estuarine environment, where they feed on mussels, crustaceans, and worms. This common starfish is in an estuary in Brittany, France.
COASTAL LAGOONS Coastal lagoons occur worldwide, and are different from the lagoons found at the centers of coral atolls (see p.152). Calmer and usually shallower than estuaries, most lagoons are connected to the sea by tidal channels. Although fresh water does not usually flow into coastal lagoons, some do receive a significant river inflow. So, as well as saltwater lagoons, there are also some partly, or predominantly, freshwater lagoons. In hot climates, some lagoons are hypersaline (saltier than ocean water), due to high evaporative losses. Although some coastal lagoons are severely polluted, the cleaner ones are often well stocked with fish, crustaceans, and other marine life, and frequently attract large numbers of shorebirds. Some provide feeding or breeding areas for sea turtles and whales.
Matagorda Bay is a lagoon on the coast of Texas, separated from the Gulf of Mexico by a long, narrow peninsula. Two channels, located near the southwest corner of the lagoon, connect it to the gulf.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LAGOON AND CHANNELS
116
coasts and the seashore ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
St. Lawrence Estuary TYPE Salt-wedge (river-dominated) estuary AREA Approximately 10,000 square miles (25,000 square km) LOCATION
Quebec, eastern Canada
The St. Lawrence Estuary is one of the world’s largest estuaries. Some 500 miles (800 km) long, it discharges about 3 million gallons (12 million liters) of water into the Gulf of St. Lawrence each second. The estuary is rich in marine life. In its wide middle and lower reaches, the icy Labrador Current flows 1,000 ft (300 m) below the surface in the opposite direction of the main estuarine flow. In one section, near the mouth of a fjord that branches off the estuary, the current’s nutrientrich waters rise abruptly and mix with warmer waters above. This upwelling of nutrients encourages plankton growth, providing the base of a food chain that involves many species of fish and birds, and a small population of beluga whales. WINTER SCENE
In winter, much of the estuary becomes iced over. A stretch of the estuary is seen here at low tide, shortly after sunrise.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
Chesapeake Bay TYPE
Partially mixed estuary AREA
3,200 square miles (8,200 square km) Surrounded by Maryland and parts of eastern Virginia, US
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LOCATION
Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the US. Its main course, fed by the Susquehanna River, is over 185 miles (300 km) in length. It has numerous sub-estuaries, and more than 150 rivers and streams drain into it. This body of water was created by sea-level rise drowning the valley of the Susquehanna and its tributaries over the last 15,000 years. Once famous for its seafood, such as oysters, clams, and crabs, the bay is now far less
productive, though it still yields more fish and shellfish than any other estuary in the US. Industrial and farm waste running into the bay causes frequent algal blooms, which block sunlight from parts of its bed. The resulting loss of vegetation has lowered oxygen levels in some areas, severely affecting animal life. The depletion of oysters, which naturally filter water, has had a particularly harmful effect on the bay’s water quality.
BAY BRIDGE
DISCOVERY
A major bridge in the upper bay connects Maryland’s rural eastern shore to its urban western shore.
)-0!#4#2!4%2 )NTHES DRILLINGOFTHE SEABEDAT#HESAPEAKE"AYLEDTO THEDISCOVERYOFAMETEORITE IMPACTCRATERMILESKM WIDEUNDERITSSOUTHERNREGION 4HE MILLION YEAR OLDCRATER HELPEDSHAPETODAYSESTUARY
SHOCKED QUARTZ
Evidence for the crater included the discovery of grains of shocked quartz, which forms when intense pressure alters its crystalline structure.
MAIN CHANNEL FLOWING THROUGH DELTA ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Mississippi Estuary TYPE
Salt-wedge (riverdominated) estuary AREA
25 square miles (60 square km) LOCATION Southeastern Mississippi Delta, southeastern Louisiana, US
The Mississippi Estuary is about 30 miles (50 km) long and lies at the seaward end of the Mississippi River, where the river flows through its own delta. The estuary consists of a main channel and several subchannels. Together, these discharge an average of some 4.75 million gallons (18 million liters) of water per second into the Gulf of Mexico. The main channel is a classic example of a salt-wedge estuary—its surface waters contain little salt, but they flow over a wedge of salt water, which extends deep down for several miles up the estuary.
117
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Laguna Madre TYPE
Hypersaline coastal lagoon AREA
14,400 square miles (3,660 square km) Southern Texas, US, and northeastern Mexico, along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico
LOCATION
The Laguna Madre is a shallow lagoon extending about 285 miles (456 km) along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. Its northern part, in Texas, is separated from the Gulf by a long, thin barrier island, Padre Island. The southern part, in Mexico, is similarly cut off by a
string of barrier islands. The entire lagoon connects with the Gulf only via a few narrow channels, and it is less than 3 ft (1 m) deep in most parts. It is saltier than seawater because it receives no input of river water and lies in a hot, dry region, leading to high rates of evaporation. Seagrass meadows and several species of crustaceans and fish thrive in the lagoon, which also supports many wintering shorebirds and waterfowl. Threats to its health include coastal development, dredging, overfishing, agricultural pesticides, and algal blooms. FLY-FISHING FOR REDFISH
The sale of licenses for fly-fishing—for trout and redfish—in the Laguna provides funds for protecting its water quality and wildlife.
ATLANTIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Lagoa dos Patos TYPE
Tidal coastal lagoon AREA
3,900 square miles (10,000 square km) LOCATION
South of the city of Porto Alegre, southern
Brazil
TWO LAGOONS
In this aerial view, Lagoa dos Patos is the pale central area. Below it, the darker Mirim Lagoon extends to the Brazil–Uruguay border.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Lagoa dos Patos (“Lagoon of Ducks”) is the world’s largest coastal lagoon. Its name is said to have been given to it by Jesuit settlers in the 16th century, who bred waterfowl on its shores. It is a shallow, tidal body of water, 155 miles (250 km) long and up to 35 miles (56 km) wide. A sand bar separates it from the Atlantic, with which it connects at its southern end via a short, narrow channel that disgorges a large plume of sediment into the ocean. Marine animals use this channel to access the lagoon; sea turtles are found in the lagoon in spring and summer. At its northern end, the lagoon receives an inflow of fresh water from the Guaíba Estuary, formed from the confluence of the Rio Jacui and three smaller rivers. Along its inner side are a number of distinctive wavelike “cusps” that have been caused by the accumulation and erosion of
sediments driven by tidal action and winds. The salinity of the lagoon varies. It consists mainly of fresh water at times of high rainfall, but there is considerable saltwater intrusion at its southern end at times of drought. Lagoa dos Patos is one of Brazil’s most vital fishing grounds. However, runoff from rice fields and pastureland, industrial effluents, and increasing population have led to concerns for the lagoon’s ecosystem.
118
coasts and the seashore ATLANTIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Amazon Estuary TYPE Salt-wedge (river-dominated) estuary AREA Approximately 7,800 square miles (20,000 square km)
LOCATION
Northern Brazil HUMAN IMPACT
The Amazon Estuary is a stretch of the Amazon River that extends more than 190 miles (300 km) inland from the river’s mouth to an area southwest of the city of Macapà.Varying in width from 15 to 190 miles (25 to 300 km), the estuary is partly filled by numerous low-lying, forested islands. The Amazon Estuary has by far the largest water output of any estuary in the world, discharging an average of 46 million gallons (175 million liters) per second into the Atlantic. The sheer magnitude of this discharge means that, almost uniquely among estuaries, there is very little saltwater intrusion into it. Instead, nearly all of the mixing between the river’s discharge and seawater occurs outside the estuary, on an area of continental shelf. Despite the relative lack of seawater intrusion, the whole estuary is significantly affected by twice-daily tides, which cause inundation (by river water) of most of the islands in the estuary.
0/2/2/#!352& 4IDALBORES LOCALLYCALLED pororocas OCCURONLARGESPRING TIDESINSEVERALOFNORTHERN "RAZILSRIVERESTUARIES3OMEOF THESEBORESATTAINHEIGHTSOFFT M ANDCANBESURFEDFOR SEVERALMILES4HISSPORT ISRATHERHAZARDOUS HOWEVER BECAUSETHEWATERSTHROUGH WHICHTHEpororocasSURGEARE HOMETODANGEROUSSNAKES FISH ANDCROCODILES
MARAJO ISLAND
The Amazon Estuary is so enormous that the biggest of the forested islands lying within it, Marajo Island, has its own river system.
ATLANTIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
River Plate TYPE
Salt-wedge (river-dominated) estuary AREA
13,500 square miles (35,000 square km) On the Argentina–Uruguay border, east of Buenos Aires and southwest of Montevideo
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LOCATION
SATELLITE VIEW
The main flow of river water over the sediments on the estuary bed is visible here, as well as the Paraná River at top left and the Uruguay River at top center.
The Plate River, or Rio de la Plata, is not a river but a large, funnel-shaped estuary formed by the confluence of the rivers Uruguay and Paraná. These rivers and their tributaries drain about one-fifth of the land area of South America. At 180 miles (290 km) long and 136 miles (220 km) wide at its mouth, the Plate discharges about 6.5 million gallons (25 million liters) of water per second into the Atlantic Ocean. As well as transporting this
vast amount of water, the estuary receives about 2 billion cubic feet (57 million cubic meters) of silt each year from its input rivers. This mud accumulates in great shoals, so that the water depth in most of the estuary is less than 10 ft (3 m). Constant dredging is therefore needed to maintain deepwater channels to the ports of Buenos Aires, which lies near the head of the estuary, and Montevideo, which is close to its mouth. Surface salinity
varies uniformly through the estuary, from close to zero in its upper parts to a value just below average ocean salinity near its mouth. Deep down, a wedge of salt water penetrates deep into the estuary. Biologically, the Plate is highly productive, yielding large annual masses of plankton, which support large numbers of fish and dense beds of clams. It is also a habitat for the La Plata dolphin, a rare, longbeaked species of river dolphin.
119 ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Curonian Lagoon TYPE
Freshwater coastal lagoon AREA
610 square miles (1,580 square km) On the Baltic Sea coasts of Lithuania and the Kaliningrad Oblast (part of Russia)
LOCATION
The Curonian Lagoon is a nontidal lagoon on the southeastern edge of the Baltic Sea, with an average depth of just 12 ft (3.8 m). The Neman River flows into the lagoon’s northern (Lithuanian) section, which discharges into the Baltic via a narrow channel, the Klaipeda Strait. While most of the lagoon consists of fresh water, seawater sometimes enters its northern part via the Klaipeda Strait following storms. In the past, the lagoon has suffered heavy
pollution from sewage and industrial effluents, but attempts are now being made to address this problem. The lagoon is separated from the Baltic by the narrow, curved Curonian Spit, which is 60 miles (98 km) long. The spit is notable for its mature pinewoods and drifting barchans (sand dunes), some reaching a height of 200 ft (60 m), which extend for 20 miles (31 km) along the spit. The sandy beaches on the spit, together with vistas over the lagoon, woods, and drifting dunes, make it a tourist attraction, and in 2000 the entire spit was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site. DUNES AND LAGOON
This quiet corner of the northern part of the lagoon is backed by the Curonian Spit’s high dunes. Migrating birds use the lagoon and nearby Neman Delta for vital rest breaks.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Hardanger Fjord TYPE Highly stratified estuary; fjord AREA Approximately 600 square miles 1,500 square km)
LOCATION
Southeast of Bergen, southwestern
Norway
READS ISLAND
This low-lying island, in the upper part of the estuary, is a breeding ground for avocets and other rare birds and is managed as a nature reserve. The view here is looking downstream.
Humber Estuary TYPE Fully mixed (tide-dominated) estuary AREA Approximately 80 square miles (200 square km)
West and southeast of Kingston-uponHull, eastern England, UK
LOCATION
This large estuary on Great Britain’s eastern coastline is formed from the confluence of the Ouse and Trent rivers. It discharges about 66,000
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Eastern Scheldt Estuary TYPE
Former estuary, now a sea-arm AREA
140 square miles (365 square km) LOCATION Southwest of Rotterdam, southwestern Netherlands
The Eastern Scheldt Estuary is a tidal body of water 25 miles (40 km) long, with a salinity similar to that of seawater. Since the late 1980s, it has
The fjord’s narrow upper parts are fed by several spectacular waterfalls, such as the Vøringsfossen, which freefalls 600 ft (182 m).
Hardanger Fjord was formed about 10,000 years ago, when a large glacier that had carved out and occupied a deep U-shaped valley in the area began to melt and retreat. As it did so, seawater flooded into the valley to create the fjord. Today, the fjord continues to receive a large input of fresh water from glacier melt. Throughout much of its length, the fjord is stratified into a lower layer of salt water, which moves into the fjord during flood tide, and an upper layer of fresher water that flows outward to the sea on the ebb tide. been cut off from its input of fresh water from the Scheldt River by dams, leading to its reclassification as a seaarm rather than an estuary. It has also been defended against seawater flooding by a storm-surge barrier (see p.104). This was originally to have been a fixed dam to prevent any ingress of seawater at all, but there were fears that, with a dam of this type, the estuary would gradually lose its salinity, producing an adverse effect on its fauna and flora—in particular, there were concerns that it would end the large-scale mussel and oyster farming in the area and degrade the tidal flats and salt marshes that form an important habitat for birds. The government of the Netherlands therefore commissioned a movable barrier, the construction of which was completed in 1986. STORM BARRIER GATES
The gates are usually raised, allowing tidal water in and out of the Eastern Scheldt Estuary. They are lowered about twice a year, during stormy weather.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
gallons (250,000 liters) of water per second into the North Sea, the largest input from any British river into this sea. After the end of the last ice age, when sea levels were much lower, the Humber was a river that flowed up to 30 miles (50 km) past the present coastline before reaching the sea. About 3.6 million cubic feet (100,000 cubic meters) of sediment are deposited in the estuary every year, mainly from offshore by tidal action. Shifting shoals formed by this sediment can obstruct shipping. The estuary’s intertidal areas are productive ecosystems that support a wide range of mollusks, worms, crustaceans, and other invertebrates. These are vital sources of food for birds, especially waders. The estuary also supports a colony of gray seals, and many lampreys pass through it every year.
Like all fjords, the Hardanger Fjord in Norway is much deeper than a typical coastal-plain estuary, with a maximum depth of some 2,600 ft (800 m). Near its mouth is a sill just 500 ft (150 m) deep. At 114 miles (183 km) long, it is the third-longest fjord in the world.
UPPER FJORD
120 ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Gironde Estuary Fully mixed (tide-dominated) estuary
TYPE
AREA Approximately 200 square miles (500 square km)
LOCATION
North of Bordeaux, western France
The Gironde Estuary, formed by the confluence of the Garonne and Dordogne rivers, is the largest estuary in Europe at almost 50 miles (80 km) long and up to 7 miles (11 km) wide. The estuary’s average discharge rate into the Atlantic is 265,000 gallons (1 million liters) per second. It has a large tidal range, of up to 16 ft (5 m) during periods of spring tide, and the strong tidal currents in the estuary, as well as numerous sand banks, tend to
hamper navigation. One of the Gironde’s most impressive features is its tidal bore—a large, wall-like wave at the leading edge of the incoming tide—known locally as the Mascaret. Occurring with each flood tide at the time of spring tides (that is, twice daily for a few days every two weeks), the bore surges from the Gironde upstream into its narrower tributaries. On the Garonne, the Mascaret sometimes forms a barreling wave, which can reach a height of 5 ft (1.5 m) and tends to break and reform. The Gironde is an important artery of the Bordeaux wine region and a rich source of eels and a wide variety of shellfish, which feature on local restaurant menus. Wild sturgeon (the source of caviar) were once also plentiful in the estuary, and although their numbers have declined due to overfishing, they are still farmed in small numbers.
THE MASCARET
When it reaches the Dordogne River, the Mascaret, or Gironde tidal bore, turns into a series of waves, which may travel up to 20 miles (30 km) upstream.
ATLANTIC OCEAN EAST
Venetian Lagoon TYPE
Saltwater coastal lagoon AREA
210 square miles (550 square km) LOCATION
On the Adriatic coast of northeastern Italy
The Venetian Lagoon is a very shallow, crescent-shaped coastal lagoon off the northern part of the Adriatic Sea. It is the largest Italian wetland and a major Mediterranean coastal ecosystem.
In addition to Venice, which sits on a small island at the center, the lagoon contains many other islands, most of which were marshy but have now been drained. Its average depth is just 28 inches (70 cm), so most boats cross the lagoon only via dredged navigation channels, and four-fifths of its area consists of salt marshes and mudflats. It takes in both riverine fresh water and seawater, and its tides have a range of up to 3 ft (1 m). During periods of spring tide,Venice is regularly flooded (see p.90). While its inhabitants have coped with this problem for centuries, land subsidence and rising sea levels now pose a major threat to the city
and its art treasures. Marine life in the lagoon includes many species of fish (from anchovies to eels, mullet, and sea bass) and invertebrates. Sea birds, waterfowl, and waders proliferate on the many uninhabited islands. Efforts are now being made to reduce industrial and agricultural pollution, including attempts to capture pollutants by means of shrubs planted along the edges of the lagoon. WATERY GEM
In the center of this photograph, taken from the International Space Station, is the fish-shaped main island of Venice. Below it is one of the lagoon’s three protective barrier islands.
JAMES ISLAND
ATLANTIC OCEAN EAST
Gambia Estuary Salt-wedge (river-dominated) estuary
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
TYPE
AREA Approximately 400 square miles (1,000 square km)
LOCATION
East of Banjul, Gambia, West Africa
The Gambia Estuary is the western half of the Gambia River, which runs 700 miles (1,130 km) through West Africa. The estuary is tidal throughout and discharges about 528,000 gallons (2 million liters) per second into the Atlantic during the rainy season, but only 528 gallons (2,000 liters) in the dry season. It contains abundant stocks of fish and shellfish, including various species of barracuda, catfish, and shrimp. James Island, near the estuary’s mouth, was a former slave transfer point and is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
estuaries and lagoons ATLANTIC OCEAN EAST
Ebrié Lagoon TYPE
Coastal lagoon of variable salinity AREA
200 square miles (520 square km) LOCATION
West of Abidjan, Ivory Coast, West Africa
The Ebrié Lagoon is one of three long, narrow lagoons that line the shores of the West African state of Ivory Coast. With a length of 62 miles (120 km) and an average width of 21/2 miles (4 km), it is the largest lagoon in West Africa. Its average depth is 16 ft (5 m). At its
eastern end, it connects to the Atlantic via a narrow artificial channel, the Vridi Canal, opened in 1951. Abidjan, the largest city in Ivory Coast, stands on several converging peninsulas and islands in an eastern part of the lagoon; other communities situated on or in the lagoon include Jacqueville and the village of Tiagba (see below). The Komoé River provides the main input of fresh water. In winter the lagoon becomes salty, but it turns to fresh water during the summer rainy reason. The levels of pollution in the lagoon have been moderately high for some years due to discharge of untreated industrial effluents and sewage from the nearby urban areas.
INDIAN OCEAN NORTH
Kerala Backwaters TYPE Chain of coastal saltwater lagoons
Approximately 400 square miles (1,000 square km) AREA
TIAGBA VILLAGE
LOCATION Southeast of Cochin, Kerala State, southwestern India
In the village of Tiagba, on the outskirts of a small island in the Ebrié Lagoon, the buildings are raised up on wooden piles.
The backwaters of Kerala in southern India are a labyrinth of lagoons and small lakes, linked by 900 miles (1,500 km) of canals. The lagoons are
LAKES AND LAGOON
In this satellite view, the Coorong Lagoon is the narrow blue strip behind the yellow sand dunes. Above are the lakes Alexandrina (left) and Albert (right).
Coorong Lagoon TYPE
Saltwater coastal lagoon AREA
80 square miles (200 square km) Southeast of Adelaide on the southeastern coast of South Australia
LOCATION
The Coorong Lagoon is a wetland that lies close to the coast of South Australia. It is famous as a haven for birds, ranging from swans and pelicans
to ducks, cranes, ibis, terns, geese, and waders such as sandpipers and stilts. The lagoon is separated from the Indian Ocean by the Younghusband Peninsula, a narrow spit of land covered by sand dunes and scrubby vegetation. The lagoon is about 93 miles (150 km) long, with a width that varies from 3 miles (5 km) to just 330 ft (100 m). At its northwestern end, the lagoon meets the outflow from Australia’s largest river, the Murray, after the river has passed through Lake Alexandrina. In this region, called the Murray Mouth, both river and lagoon meet the sea, and the Coorong can receive both
fresh and salty water. The lagoon was once freely connected to the lake, from which it received a much larger supply of fresh water. In 1940, however, barrages were built between the lagoon and the lake to prevent seawater from reaching the lake and the lower reaches of the Murray River. The salinity of the lagoon’s waters increases naturally with distance from the sea due to evaporative losses. However, reduced water flows from the Murray, due to a combination of barrage construction and extraction of water for irrigation projects, has caused a gradual further increase in salinity throughout the lagoon. There
VEMBANAD LAKE
Vembanad, the largest Kerala coastal lagoon, is listed as a Wetland of International Importance under the Ramsar Convention.
shielded from the sea by low barrier islands that formed across the mouths of the many rivers flowing down from the surrounding hills. During the summer monsoon rains, the lagoons overflow and discharge sediments into the sea, but toward the end of the rains, the seawater rushes in, altering salinity levels. The aquatic life in the backwaters, which includes crabs, frogs, otters, and turtles, is well adapted to this seasonal variation.
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AUSTRALIAN PELICANS
This pelican, one of seven species worldwide, is widespread in Australia, where it lives on freshwater, brackish, and saltwater wetlands.
is ample evidence that this has adversely affected the lagoon’s ecosystem. In particular, several species of plants have become less abundant or disappeared, many fish species have declined, and migratory bird numbers have fallen. Further, the reduced flow from the Murray may result in the eventual closure of the channel joining the lagoon to the ocean, which would prevent migration of fish and other animals between the two.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
INDIAN OCEAN SOUTHEAST
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122
coasts and the seashore PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Pearl River Estuary TYPE
Salt-wedge (riverdominated) estuary AREA
450 square miles (1,200 square km) LOCATION Northwest of Hong Kong, Guangdong, southeastern China
INDIAN OCEAN SOUTHEAST
Northern Spencer Gulf Estuary TYPE
Inverse estuary AREA
Approximately 2,000 square miles (5,000 square km) LOCATION
Northwest of Adelaide, South Australia
The estuary in the north of Australia’s Spencer Gulf is classified as an inverse estuary, owing to its unusual pattern of salt distribution and water circulation.
DEEP GULF
Spencer Gulf is the larger wedge-shaped coastal indent visible in this satellite image. The desert around its head helps produce the estuary’s unusual circulation pattern.
In a reverse of the usual pattern, this estuary’s waters become saltier toward its head, away from its mouth. This is because its head is surrounded by hot desert and loses more water to evaporation than enters it from rivers. The head’s high salinity means that it draws in from the mouth ocean water of lower salinity than the water drawn in by a typical estuary. The estuary is surrounded by extensive tidal flats, seagrass banks, and mangroves.
The bell-shaped Pearl River Estuary receives and carries most of the outflow from the Pearl River, the common name for a complex system of rivers in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong. The estuary is nearly 37 miles (60 km) long, and its width increases from 12 miles (20 km) at its head to about 30 miles (50 km) at its mouth. To the north and west of the estuary is a delta, formed from the confluence of the Xi Jiang and other rivers of the Pearl River system. Together, these rivers discharge an average of GUANGZHOU
Formerly known as Canton, this large and busy port city lies on a northerly extension of the Pearl River Estuary.
PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Yangtze Estuary TYPE
Partially mixed estuary AREA
1,000 square miles (2,500 square km)
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LOCATION
WUHAN BRIDGE
The double-decker Wuhan bridge, completed in 1957, was the first bridge built over the lower part of the Yangtze.
2.6 million gallons (10 million liters) of water per second into the South China Sea. Mostly less than 30 ft (9 m) deep, but containing some deeper dredged channels, the Pearl River Estuary has a tidal range of 3–6 ft (1–2 m). It drains water from some of the most densely populated areas of China, and so is severely polluted with sewage and industrial waste. About 617 million tons (560 million metric tons) of domestic waste and 2.2 billion tons (2 billion metric tons) of industrial effluent enter the estuary each year. Over the past 20 years, this pollution has led to frequent algal blooms that threaten local fishing and aquaculture. Pollution is also a threat to the 1,400 Chinese white dolphins that live in the estuary.
Northwest of Shanghai, eastern China
The Yangtze Estuary is the lower, tide-affected part of the Yangtze (or Changjiang)—the longest river in Asia and the third longest in the world. The estuary occupies 430 miles (700 km) of the river’s 3,900-mile (6,300-km) length. Near its mouth, it splits into three smaller rivers and numerous streams that run through a delta. Here, silt deposition continually creates new land, which is used for agriculture. The estuary carries an average of 7.9 million gallons (30 million liters) of water per second into the East China Sea; its average depth is 23 ft (7 m), and the average tidal range at its mouth is 9 ft (2.7 m). It supports large numbers of fish and birds, although fish stocks have declined over the past 20 years due to overfishing and pollution. The estuary’s waters may be fresh, brackish, or salty, depending on the season. In winter, salt water intrudes a significant distance upstream, making the water unfit for drinking and irrigation. Recently, this intrusion has occurred more frequently due to reduced river flow—a reduction that is likely to be exacerbated by the Three Gorges Dam project farther upstream. Reduced flows may worsen the acute water shortage in the city of Shanghai on the estuary’s southern shore, as well as affect the dispersion and dilution of pollutants around the estuary. Silt deposition in the delta is also likely to fall, reducing the rate of new land creation.
estuaries and lagoons PACIFIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Doubtful Sound TYPE
Highly stratified estuary; fjord AREA
30 square miles (70 square km) West of Dunedin, southwestern South Island, New Zealand
LOCATION
Doubtful Sound is one of 14 major fjords that were formed 15,000 years ago in a scenic part of New Zealand’s South Island. Some 25 miles (40 km) long and opening onto the Tasman Sea, it is surrounded by steep hills from which hundreds of small waterfalls descend during the rainy season. Its name originated in 1770 during the first voyage to New Zealand by the English explorer Captain James Cook (1728–79). He called the fjord Doubtful Harbor
because he was skeptical of being able to sail out again if he entered it. Doubtful Sound is the second-longest and the deepest of the New Zealand fjords, with a maximum depth of 1,380 ft (421 m). It receives fresh water from a hydroelectric power station at its head and from a huge 236 in (6,000 mm) of rainfall annually. Like all fjords, it contains fresh water in its top few yards and a much denser, colder, saltier layer below. There is little mixing between the two. Doubtful Sound is home to bottlenose dolphins, New Zealand fur seals, and many species of fish, starfish, sponges, and sea anemones. SOUND VIEW
This view of the head of Doubtful Sound, looking toward the open ocean, is from the hills of the south-central region of New Zealand’s South Island.
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
San Francisco Bay 1,600 square miles (4,160 square km ) LOCATION
Central California, western US
San Francisco Bay, the largest estuary on North America’s west coast, consists of four smaller, interconnected bays. One of these, Suisun Bay, receives fresh water drained from about 40 percent of California’s land area. This water flows into San Pablo Bay and then Central Bay, where it mixes with salt water that has entered deep down from the Pacific Ocean via the Golden Gate channel. From Central Bay, there is little flow of fresh water to the largest body of water, South San Francisco Bay, but there is
Laguna San Ignacio TYPE
Hypersaline coastal lagoon AREA
140 square miles (360 square km) On the Pacific coast of the Baja California Peninsula, Mexico, southeast of Mexicali
LOCATION
OAKLAND BAY BRIDGE
Thick fog surrounds the lower half of the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge, one of five bridges that cross the bay.
TYPE
Partially mixed tectonic estuary AREA
PACIFIC OCEAN EAST
123
The Laguna San Ignacio is a coastal lagoon in northwestern Mexico best known as a sanctuary and breeding ground for Pacific gray whales. Latin America’s largest wildlife sanctuary, it is also an important feeding habitat for four endangered species of sea turtle. The lagoon, which is 25 miles (40 km) long and on average 6 miles (9 km) wide, receives only occasional inflows of fresh water, and its evaporative losses are high. Its salinity is therefore
significantly higher at its head than at its mouth, where it connects to the sea. Apart from whale watching, the main human activities in the area are small-scale fisheries and oyster cultivation. In 1993, the lagoon was designated a World Heritage Site. LAGOON BEACH
Waves break on the shore at San Ignacio Lagoon, which is surrounded by a landscape of sparse desert scrub.
some surface outflow of brackish water to the Pacific. San Francisco Bay is a tectonic estuary—one caused by movement at tectonic faults (lines of weakness) in Earth’s crust, of which there are several in the area, notably the San Andreas Fault. During the past 150 years, human activity has resulted in the loss of 90 percent of the bay’s surrounding marshy wetland, a greatly reduced flow of fresh water (which has been diverted for agricultural purposes), and contamination by sewage and effluent. Nevertheless, the bay remains an important ecological habitat. Its waters are home to large numbers of economically valuable marine species, such as Dungeness crab and Pacific halibut, and millions of geese and ducks annually use the bay as a refuge.
HUMAN IMPACT
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OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
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125
ALGAE-COVERED MUDFLATS
Some mudflats, such as these in Alaska, become heavily encrusted with green algae. The algae is often itself colonized by large numbers of tiny marine snails. HUMAN IMPACT
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ANIMAL LIFE
GREAT EGRET
A common inhabitant of salt marshes in the US and parts of east Asia, the great egret feeds on small fish, invertebrates, and small mice. It breeds in some marshes. MARSH HOUSING DEVELOPMENT
This coastal development in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, has been built on top of a drained salt marsh. However, the adjoining area of marsh has been carefully preserved.
LUGWORM CASTS
Lugworms live in burrows some 8–16 in (20–40 cm) deep in tidal flats. They feed by taking in sand or mud, digesting any organic matter, and excreting the rest as a cast.
NATTERJACK TOAD
This toad, found in parts of western and northern Europe, inhabits upper salt marsh habitats (just below the high marsh), where it uses shallow ponds to breed.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Measured by the amount of organic matter (the base material for food chains) that they produce, salt marshes are extremely productive habitats. Most of this material comes from decaying plant material. When plants die, they are partially decomposed by bacteria and fungi, and the resulting detritus is consumed by animals such as worms, mussels, snails, crabs, shrimp, and amphipods living in the marsh, and zooplankton living in the salt water. These in turn provide food for larger animals. Salt marshes provide nursery areas for many species of fish, and feeding and nesting sites for birds such as egrets, herons, harriers, and terns. Tidal flats are home to many types of crustaceans, worms, and mollusks, which either feed on the surface or burrow beneath it. These in turn provide food for enormous numbers of wading birds.
126
MARSH AT LOW TIDE
Patches of salt marsh surround the basin, together with tidal flats that can extend for up to 3 miles (5 km) from the shore at low tide.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
Minas Basin TYPE Tidal sandflats and mudflats, and salt marshes AREA 490 square miles (1,250 square km)
Eastern part of Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia, Canada
LOCATION
The Minas Basin is a semi-enclosed inlet of the Bay of Fundy. It consists of a triangular area of tidal mudflats and sandflats, surrounded by patches of salt marsh, most of which have been diked and drained for agriculture. Twice a day, the sea fills and empties the basin, rising and falling by over 40 ft (12 m), which is the largest tidal range in the world. No other coastal marine area has such a large proportion of its floor exposed at low
tide. Sediments in the basin, which are brought in and deposited by tides, range from coarse sand to fine silt and clay. The tidal flats formed by these sediments contain high densities of a marine amphipod, the Bay of Fundy mud-shrimp, which provides food for huge numbers of migrating shorebirds,
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
Cape Cod Salt Marshes TYPE
Salt marshes AREA
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
30 square miles (80 square km) LOCATION
Cape Cod, eastern Massachusetts, US
Salt marshes are the dominant type of coastal wetland around Cape Cod, although about a third of the region’s marshes have been lost or severely degraded within the past 100 years. These salt marshes occur behind barrier beaches or spits and within estuarine systems, and have developed over the past 3,000 years in response to sea-level rise. They mainly RACE POINT
A typical area of salt marsh can be seen here behind dunes at Race Point, at the northern extreme of Cape Cod.
including sandpipers and plovers. The numbers peak from July to October, and for some species exceed 1 percent of the world population. SEMIPALMATED SANDPIPER
Half a million semipalmated sandpipers stop off in the Minas Basin each year on their way from North America’s Arctic regions to South America.
consist of high marsh, where the dominant plant species is saltmeadow cordgrass, with some scattered areas of low intertidal marsh, dominated by smooth cordgrass. The low marsh areas are flooded twice daily and the high marsh twice a month, during the highest spring tides. The largest individual marsh is the Great Salt Marsh to the west of the town of Barnstable. With deep channels running through it, this is a popular area to explore by kayak. The marshes around Cape Cod serve as a breeding and foraging habitat for a diversity of brackish and freshwater animals. Among these are two rare and protected bird species, the northern harrier and least tern, and two endangered reptiles, the diamond-backed terrapin and eastern box turtle. Restoring degraded salt marshes on Cape Cod is regarded as a top priority for many regional and national conservation organizations. Restoration will allow these wetlands to regain their function as a barrier protecting the coastline from storm surges and as a natural sponge that filters pollutants and excess nutrients from the water runoff in the region.
127 ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
South Carolina Low Country TYPE
Salt marshes and tidal mudflats AREA
630 square miles (1,600 square km) LOCATION South Carolina coast, southwest and northeast of Charleston, US
The Low Country contains one of the most extensive systems of salt marsh and tidal flats in the United States. Its size results from the broad, gently sloping, sandy coast of the US eastern seaboard, coupled with a moderately high tidal range of 5–7 ft (1.5–2 m).
Each day, two high tides inundate a vast area of the coastal zone, maintaining a system of channels, creeks, and rivers. The influence of both fresh and salt water here results in some diverse ecological communities. Smooth cordgrass is the dominant grass in the lower marshes, where the ground stays wet and muddy as a result of the tides. From late spring to fall, darker deadlooking sections of a grass called needle rush can also be seen. These two grasses are replaced toward higher ground by sea oxeye and the similar but taller marsh elder. In the lower marshes and the bordering tidal flats, mud snails, crabs, shrimp, worms, and other tiny inhabitants burrow into the mud, while attached and clinging to the stalks of the grasses are ribbed mussels and marsh periwinkles. Among the fish living in the silty tidal wash are croaker, menhaden, and mullet. Birds living here include marsh wrens and clapper rails. CORDGRASS MEADOWS
A tidal channel weaves its way through stands of smooth cordgrass, the dominant plant species in the lower marsh areas.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Morecambe Bay TYPE Tidal mudflats and sandflats, and salt marshes AREA 120 square miles (310 square km)
LOCATION
Northwest England, UK
MORECAMBE MUDFLATS
The ebbing tide reveals half of the bay’s total area as undulating expanses of mud and sand, meandering channels, and tidal pools.
The edges of the Wadden Sea are a mosaic of marsh patches broken up by shallow tidal channels.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Wadden Sea TYPE Tidal mudflats and sandflats, salt marshes, and islands AREA 4,000 square miles (10,000 square km)
LOCATION North Sea coast from Esbjerg, Denmark, along northern Germany, to Den Helder, Netherlands
The Wadden Sea is not a sea in the conventional sense but an extensive body of shallow water and associated tidal flats, salt marshes, and low-lying islands in northwestern Europe.
Straddling the shores of Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands, the Wadden Sea has been formed by storm surges and sea-level rise inundating an area of coast, combined with the deposition of fine silt by rivers. It is an important nursery for North Sea fish species such as plaice and common sole, and its extensive mudflats are home to enormous numbers of mollusks and worms. The salt marshes provide a habitat for more than 1,500 species of insects and are important feeding and breeding grounds for many species of birds. Unfortunately, these marshes are threatened by agriculture, dike building for coastal protection, and tourism.
HUMAN IMPACT
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OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Formed from the confluence of five estuaries, those of the Kent, Keer, Leven, Lune, and Wyre rivers, Morecambe Bay is the largest continuous area of tidal flats in the UK. Broad, shallow, and funnel-shaped, the bay has a large tidal range, of up to 35 ft (10.5 m). During periods of spring tides, the sea can ebb as far as 7 miles (12 km) back from the high-water mark. The flood tide comes up the bay faster than a person can run, and parts of the bay are also affected by quicksand, posing dangers for anyone who does not know the area well. The bay’s extensive mudflats support a rich and diverse range of invertebrate animals, including cockles and mussels, snails, shrimp, and lugworms, as well as one of the largest populations of shorebirds in the UK. The bay regularly hosts 170,000 wintering waders, with several species present in internationally significant numbers, including oystercatchers, curlews, dunlins, and knots. The tidal flats are surrounded by extensive salt marshes, which make up about 5 percent of the total salt marsh in
the UK and support a number of rare plants. Much of this marsh area is grazed by sheep and cattle. The bay is an important location for commercial fishing; the fish species most commonly caught include bass, cod, whitebait, and plaice. However, Morecambe Bay has not escaped the problems of pollution common to many coastal areas of northwestern Europe. Oil, chemicals, and plastic are among the more common pollutants of this ecosystem.
SALT-MARSH MOSAIC
128
coasts and the seashore ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
The Wash TYPE
Salt marshes, tidal sandflats, and mudflats AREA
100 square miles (250 square km) LOCATION
Northeast of Peterborough, England, UK
comprise the largest single area of this habitat in Britain and are growing in extent. The main plant species making up these salt marshes, which are traditionally used as grazing lands by farmers, are cordgrass and glasswort in roughly equal amounts. The Wash is one of the most important sites in the UK for wild birds, its sheltered tidal flats providing a vast feeding ground for migrating birds, such as geese, ducks, and waders.
These come to spend the winter in the Wash in huge numbers, with an average total of about 300,000 birds, from as far away as Greenland and Siberia. In addition, the Wash is an important breeding area for common terns and a feeding area for marsh harriers. It has been declared a Special Protection Area (SPA) under EU law. In 2000, parts of the artificial coastal defenses on the western side of the Wash were deliberately breached
to increase the area of salt marsh in the region. This has taken pressure off other nearby sea defenses, because the newly establishing area of salt marsh soaks up wave energy, acting as a natural sea defense. This is a relatively novel approach to coastal management that employs “soft engineering” techniques to defend against the erosive power of the sea. It also has the added environmental advantage of providing additional habitat for wildlife.
The Wash is a large, square-mouthed, shallow estuary on the eastern coast of England, surrounded by extensive areas of tidal sandflats, some mudflats, and salt marshes. It is fed by four main rivers: the Great Ouse, Nene, Welland, and Witham. The sandflats of the Wash range from extensive fine sands to drying banks of coarse sand and are home to large communities of bivalve mollusks, crustaceans, and polychaete worms. The extensive salt marshes TERRINGTON MARSHES
Located close to the mouth of the Nene River, these marshes form part of the Wash National Nature Reserve.
HUMAN IMPACT
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EDGE OF THE MARSHES
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
The dominant plant species in the nonexploited areas of salt marsh, such as at La Turballe in the northern part of the marshes, include sea-blite, cordgrass, and glasswort. ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Guérande Salt Marshes TYPE Salt marshes, artificial salt pans, and tidal mudflats AREA 20 square miles (50 square km)
LOCATION
Northwest of St. Nazaire, Atlantic coast
of France
The region of salt marshes close to the medieval town of Guérande is most famous for its salt production but is also a noted ecological site, important for its role as a feeding and resting site
for large numbers of birds. The salt marshes came to exist in their present state through a combination of geology, climatic factors, and human intervention. Around the coast near Guérande, a system of spits and coastal dunes developed thousands of years ago, cutting off an area of shallow water, which was nevertheless subject to tides—seawater could flow in through two inlets in the dune belts. Over the centuries, marshes and tidal flats developed in this basin. During the past 1,000 years or so, these have been artificially converted into a mosaic of salt pans, separated by clay walls, although some areas remain unexploited. During the flood tide, seawater is allowed to flow through
channels into the pans, and during the warm summer months, when the rate of evaporation is high, sea salt is skimmed from the surface of the pans by an army of salt-farmers (paludriers). The areas of marsh surrounding the salt pans are made up of various salt-tolerant plants. More than 70 different species of birds nest and breed in the area, and many species spend the winter here in large numbers. For many years, the saltfarmers and the French ornithological society, the LPO, have jointly organized exhibitions and guided tours in the Guérande Salt Marshes, which are themed on the economics of salt production, the ecology of the marshes, and their need for protection.
4HE'UéRANDEREGIONHASHADSALT PANSFOROVER YEARS4ODAY ABOUTSALT FARMERSWORKIN THEAREA ONEOFTHEFEWPLACESIN &RANCEWHERESALTCONTINUESTObe PRODUCEDINATRADITIONALMANUAL WAY4HEAVERAGEANNUALHARVEST ISABOUT TONSOFNATURAL MINERAL RICHSEASALT WHICHISSOLD UNREFINED WITHNOTHINGADDED ANDNOTHINGREMOVED4HESALT HASALIGHTGRAYCOLORBECAUSE OFITSCONTENTOFFINECLAYFROM THESALTPANS
129 PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHWEST
Saemangeum Wetlands
Yatsu-Higata Tidal Flat
TYPE
TYPE
Mudflats, sandflats, and salt marshes
Tidal mudflat AREA
AREA
0.4 square km (1/6 square mile)
155 square miles (400 square km) LOCATION
South of Seoul, on the west coast of South Korea
LOCATION Narashino City, at the northern part of Tokyo Bay, Japan
Situated at the confluence of the Mangyeung and Dongjin river estuaries, on South Korea’s Yellow Sea coast, the Saemangeum Wetlands is a shorebird staging site of great importance. Its tidal flats and shallows support many bird species, some of which are considered to be globally threatened. In 2006, the status of this
Yatsu-Higata is a tiny rectangular mudflat at the northern end of Tokyo Bay, and is unusual because it is almost completely surrounded by a dense urban area. Once open shoreline, Yatsu-Higata now sits 3/5 mile (1 km) inland. Twice daily, it experiences a tidal inflow and outflow of water from Tokyo Bay via two concrete channels. When the tide comes in, the mudflat fills with about 3 ft (1 m) of water. When it flows out, a variety of resident and migrant shorebirds congregate to feed on the lugworms, crabs, and other marine animals that live within the fine silt that remains. Yatsu-Higata is an important stopover point for migrating birds flying from Siberia to Australia and Southeast Asia.
SPOON-BILLED SANDPIPER
This extremely rare species is one of the shorebirds most threatened by the reclamation project.
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Alaskan Mudflats TYPE
Tidal mudflats AREA
4,000 square miles (10,000 square km)
Various coastal inlets of southern and western Alaska, US
LOCATION
wetland—as well as the thousands of migratory birds that depend on it as a key feeding area— came under threat due to the completion of a 22-mile- (33-km-) long sea wall at the mouth of the two estuaries. The sea wall is part of a reclamation project Many areas on the coast of southern and western Alaska are fringed by mudflats that appear at low tide. They are formed of a finely ground silt that in some areas is several hundred yards deep. This silt has originated from the action of Alaska’s numerous glaciers, which have been grinding away at the surrounding mountains for thousands of years. As these glaciers melt, the silt is carried to the coast in meltwater and deposited as sediment
LOW TIDE AT DONGJIN ESTUARY
The area around the estuary consists of tidal flats and scattered salt marsh intersected by channels that fill at high tide.
that involves cultivating the tidal flats, and converting the remaining estuarine areas into freshwater reservoirs. The project is going ahead despite the fears of conservation groups that it will result in irreversible environmental damage. when it reaches the sea. Because tidal ranges around Alaska are generally high, the total area of mudflats exposed at low tide is huge. These mudflats are an important stopover for migrating shorebirds. Various species of burrowing worms and bivalve mollusks are an important source of food for these waders and for the waterfowl that feed on the mudflats through the winter. Harbor seals also use the mudflats as rest areas.
"ROWNBEARSAREOCCASIONALVISITORS TOSOME!LASKANMUDFLATS WHERE THEYDIGFOR0ACIFICRAZORCLAMS BURIEDINTHEMUD4HEYPROBABLY FINDTHECLAMSBYLOOKINGFORTHE SMALLHOLESTHEYLEAVEONTHESURFACE ASTHEYBURROWDOWN%XTRACTING THEMISTRICKY SINCEWHENDISTURBED THEYBURROWDOWNFURTHER ALASKAN BROWN BEAR
This large adult bear is digging on the coast of Katmai National Park, at the eastern end of the Alaskan Peninsula.
DRYING MUDFLATS
These mudflats are at the edge of a large delta on the southwest coast of Alaska, formed by the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
$)'').'&/2#,!-3
The mudflats are dangerous for human visitors, because in some areas they behave like quicksand. Even mud that at first seems firm enough to support a person may in reality be treacherous. A number of people have become stuck and some have even drowned.
131
ANIMAL LIFE
BANDED ARCHERFISH
Mangrove swamps are rich centers of biodiversity. Mangrove trees produce enormous amounts of leaf litter, as well as twigs and bits of bark, which drop into the water. Some of this immediately becomes food for animals such as crabs, but most is broken down by bacteria and fungi, which turn it into food for fish and shrimp. These in turn produce waste, which, along with the even smaller mangrove litter, is consumed by mollusks, amphipods, marine worms, small crustaceans, and brittlestars. Some of these become food for larger fish, and the various fish species provide food for larger animals. Across the world, mangrove swamps are home to an enormous number and MANGROVE diversity of birds and several endangered BRITTLESTAR species of crocodiles. Other types of This scavenger is one of the few echinoderms animals found in great numbers and found in mangrove diversity in mangrove swamps include swamps. It is highly frogs, snakes, insects, and mammals mobile, using its long ranging from swamp rats to tigers. arms to pull itself along.
This little fish inhabits mangrove swamps in the Indian and Pacific oceans. It is known as an archerfish because it feeds mainly on flying insects, which it knocks out of the air and into the water by spitting at them.
JABIRU STORK
This large stork inhabits mangrove swamps and other wetlands throughout the tropical Americas, feeding on a range of prey, including snakes.
3(2)-0&!2-).'
SHELTER FROM PREDATORS
Cardinalfish, sheltering here in a mangrove swamp in Papua New Guinea, are one of the many types of small tropical fish that use mangrove roots for protection from predators.
/VERHALFTHEWORLDSMANGROVE SWAMPSHAVEBEENDESTROYEDIN RECENTDECADESANDHAVEBEENBUILT ONORTURNEDINTOCOMMERCIAL ENTERPRISESSUCHASSHRIMPFARMS INCLUDINGTHEONESHOWNHERE IN 6IETNAM 5NFORTUNATELY INTENSIVE SHRIMPFARMINGOFTENHASDEVASTATING ENVIRONMENTALEFFECTS4YPICALLY THEEFFLUENTFROMSHRIMPPONDS POLLUTESNEARBYCOASTALWATERS DESTROYINGMOREMANGROVESASWELL ASCORALREEFSALONGTHECOASTLINE
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
HUMAN IMPACT
132
MANGROVE-LINED CHANNEL
Here, parallel stands of red mangrove line a shallow offshoot channel of Florida Bay in the southern part of the Everglades National Park.
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Everglades PRINCIPAL SPECIES
Red, black, and white Mangroves Mangroves only: 600 square miles (1,500 square km) AREA
LOCATION
Southwestern Florida, US
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Alvarado Mangrove Coast
Mangroves occupy a large, roughly triangular area at the southwestern tip of southern Florida, where a maze of islands along the coast is intersected by mangrove-lined channels. Here, where the salt water of the Gulf of Mexico and Florida Bay meets fresh water that has traveled from Lake Okeechobee in central Florida, is the largest area of mangrove swamps in North America.
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve
PRINCIPAL SPECIES
PRINCIPAL SPECIES
Red, white, and black mangroves
Red, black, white, and button Mangroves
AREA 600 square miles (1,500 square km)
AREA
400 square miles (1,000 square km)
LOCATION
Around Veracruz, southern Mexico, on Bay of Campeche, in southwestern Gulf of Mexico
LOCATION Eastern coast of Yucatán Peninsula, eastern Mexico, 90 miles (150 km) south of Cancún
The Alvarado Mangroves Ecoregion in southern Mexico is an extensive area of mangrove swamps mixed in with other habitats such as reed beds and palm forests. The mangroves grow on flat coastal land interspersed with brackish lagoons fed by several small rivers. The swamps are brimming with life, from rays gliding in the calm waters to snails climbing the mangrove roots, whose tangled network protects many fish and invertebrates from predators. Bird life in and around the swamps includes the keel-billed toucan, reddish egret, wood stork, and several species of herons and kingfishers, while the mammalian inhabitants include spider monkeys and West Indian manatees. Some large areas of mangroves in the region have been destroyed, and those that remain are under pressure from logging, agricultural expansion, oil extraction, and frequent oil spills.
Stretching for 75 miles (120 km) along Mexico’s Caribbean coast, the Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve contains a mixture of mangrove swamps, lagoons,
ANHINGA
This diving bird hunts fish, frogs, and baby alligators in the Everglades mangroves.
The dominant species along the edges of the sea and the numerous channels is the red mangrove—water within the channels is normally stained brown from tannin contained in the leaves of this species. In addition to their role in stabilizing shorelines with and freshwater marshes; it was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1987. The mangroves are protected from the energy of the Caribbean Sea by a barrier reef growing along the coast. However, the reserve’s terrestrial part is between 20 and 75 percent flooded, depending on season. Sian Ka’an’s mangrove systems are some of the most biologically productive in the world and their health is critical for the survival of many species in the western Caribbean region. Hidden between the massive mangrove roots live oysters, sponges, sea squirts, sea anemones, hydroids, and crustaceans. Bird species found here include roseate spoonbills, pelicans, greater
their large prop roots, red mangroves are crucial to the Everglades ecosystem, acting as a nursery for many species of fish, as well as shrimp, mussels, sponges, crabs, and other invertebrates. The other principal mangrove species in the Everglades are the black mangrove and white mangrove. Both of these grow closer to the shore than red mangroves, so they are in contact with seawater only at high tide. The Everglades swamps provide a feeding flamingos, jabiru storks, and 15 species of heron. The swamps are also home to West Indian manatees and two endangered crocodiles: the American crocodile and Morelet’s crocodile. The explosion of tourism in the nearby resort of Cancún poses several threats to the area. Unregulated development has increased pollution and altered the distribution and use of water in Sian Ka’an, compromising the health of the mangroves. BOAT TOUR
Because a large part of Sian Ka’an is flooded for much of the year, there are few roads into the area, so much of it can be reached and explored only by boat.
133
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and nesting site for several mammals, including swamp rats, and numerous bird species, such as herons, egrets, gallinules, anhingas, and brown pelicans. While much of the region has an abundant alligator population, the swamps are the sole remaining stronghold in the US for the rare and endangered American crocodile. Also occasionally spotted in the channels between the mangroves are West Indian manatees (sea cows).
The Florida mangroves are sometimes damaged by the hurricanes that hit the region, Hurricane Andrew in 1992 being an example. Hurricanes damage mangroves in two ways: strong winds may defoliate them, and storm surges harm them by depositing large quantities of silt on their roots. Fortunately, mangrove forests are resilient ecosystems, and they usually regenerate fully from hurricane damage within a few years.
3INCE THE-AYANCICHLID ANEXOTICFISHSPECIESFROM#ENTRAL !MERICA HASBEENSPREADING RAPIDLYTHROUGHTHE MANGROVESWAMPSAND OTHERWETLANDAREASOFTHE %VERGLADES.OONEYET KNOWSWHATEFFECTITMAY HAVEONTHEREGIONSECOSYSTEM 4HEREAREWORRIESTHATITMAY DISPLACENATIVEFISHSPECIES ALTERNATIVELY ITCOULDBE OCCUPYINGANEWªNICHE«THAT NOOTHERFISHSPECIESHASFILLED
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Belize Coast Mangroves PRINCIPAL SPECIES
Red, black, white, and button mangroves AREA
1,100 square miles (2,800 square km) LOCATION Eastern Belize, on the western margins of the Caribbean Sea
rivers and trapping sediment, the mangroves also protect the clarity of the coastal waters, helping the coral reef to survive. Numerous cays—small islands composed largely of coral or sand—along the coast are covered with mangroves and form a habitat for birds. In all, more than 250 bird species share the swamps with West Indian manatees and a variety of reptiles, including boa constrictors, American crocodiles, and iguanas. MANGROVE ROOTS
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Zapata Swamp PRINCIPAL SPECIES
AREA
1,000 square miles (2,500 square km) Western Cuba, 100 miles (160 km) southeast of Havana
LOCATION
The Zapata Swamp is a mosaic of mangrove swamps and freshwater and saltwater marshes that form the largest and best-preserved wetland in the Caribbean. The swamp was designated a Biosphere Reserve in 1999 and forms a vital preserve for Cuban wildlife, a spawning area for commercially valuable fish, and a crucial wintering territory for millions of migratory birds from North America. More than
Large numbers of these colorful birds live in the swamp, feeding off algae, shrimp, mollusks, and insect larvae that inhabit the mud at the bottom of the shallow waters.
900 plant species have been recognized in the swamp, and all but three of the 25 bird species endemic to Cuba breed there. All together, about 170 bird species have been identified in the swamp, including the common black-hawk, the greater flamingo, and the world’s smallest bird, the bee hummingbird. It also contains the remaining few thousand Cuban crocodiles. Mammalian residents include the Cuban hutia, a gopherlike rodent, and the West Indian manatee. The manjuari, or Cuban gar, is an unusual fish found only in the swamp. Adjacent to the swamp is the Bay of Pigs, where millions of land crabs breed each spring.
The mangrove swamps here are a nursery ground for many fish species associated with the huge Belize Barrier Reef. By filtering runoff from
A tangled maze of mangrove roots extends beneath the water’s surface all along this coast, providing refuge for a variety of juvenile fish.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Red, black, white, and button mangroves
GREATER FLAMINGOS
134
coasts and the seashore INDIAN OCEAN WEST
Madagascar Mangroves Gray, yellow, long-fruited stilt, and large-leafed orange mangroves
PRINCIPAL SPECIES
AREA 1,300 square miles (3,300 square km)
Scattered areas around the coast of Madagascar, off the eastern coast of Africa
LOCATION
INDIAN OCEAN NORTH
Pichavaram Mangrove Wetland
Mangroves occur in a wide range of environmental conditions on Madagascar, fostered by a high tidal range, extensive low-lying coastal areas, and a constant supply of fresh river water, which brings a high silt load. They occupy about 600 miles (1,000 km) of the island’s coastline and are often associated with coral reefs, which protect them from ocean swell. The mangroves, in turn, capture river sediment that otherwise would threaten both reefs and seagrass beds. Up to nine different mangrove species
INDIAN OCEAN NORTH
Sundarbans Mangrove Forest
Gray, milky, stilted, smallfruited orange, and yellow mangroves
Sundri, milky mangrove, yellow mangrove, Indian mangrove, keora
AREA 5 square miles (12 square km)
AREA 3,200 square miles (8,000 square km)
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
PRINCIPAL SPECIES
PRINCIPAL SPECIES
LOCATION
South of Chennai (Madras), Tamil Nadu, southeastern India
LOCATION Southwestern Bangladesh and northeastern India, between Calcutta and Chittagong
The Pichavaram Mangrove Wetland lies on a delta between the Vellar and Coleroon estuaries in southeastern India. It consists of a number of small and large mangrove-covered islets intersected by numerous channels and creeks. Fishing villages, croplands, and aquaculture ponds surround the area. This small, carefully preserved wetland is thought to have saved many lives during the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. When the tsunami struck, six villages that were physically protected by the mangroves incurred no damage, while other, unprotected villages were totally devastated. The wetland may have reduced the tsunami’s impact partly by slowing the onward rush of the sea through frictional effects and partly by absorbing water into its numerous canals and creeks.
This forest, a World Heritage Site since 1997, is the largest continuous mangrove ecosystem in the world. It is part of a
have been recorded in Madagascar, although only six are widespread. Several of Madagascar’s endemic birds, including the Madagascar heron, Madagascar teal, and Madagascar fish-eagle, use the mangroves and associated wetland habitats. Dugongs (relatives of manatees) glide through the waters, feeding on sea grasses, while huge quantities of invertebrates and fish swim freely among the fingerlike roots of the mangroves. These provide an abundance of food for animals such as the Nile crocodile,
sharks, and aquatic and wading birds, such as herons, spoonbills, and egrets. Many of the fish and bird species here are found nowhere else in the world. Unfortunately, the mangroves are threatened by urban development, overfishing, and the development of land for rice and shrimp farming. MANGROVE MAZE
This area of coastal mangroves, bisected by numerous channels, is located on the northeastern coast of Madagascar, at the mouth of the Ambodibonara River.
huge delta formed by sediments from the Ganges, Brahmaputra, and Meghna rivers. The region contains thousands of mangrove-covered islands intersected by an intricate network of waterways. The Bengal tiger swims here from island to island, hunting prey such as spotted deer and wild boar. Other inhabitants include fishing cats, rhesus macaque monkeys, water monitor lizards, hermit crabs, and various species of sharks and dolphins. Habitat destruction threatens this region: more than half of the original mangroves have been cut down.
'!6)!, /NEEXTREMELYENDANGERED INHABITANTOFTHEWETLANDS ANDRIVERSOF"ANGLADESHIS THEGAVIAL ACROCODILIAN /NCEQUITECOMMONIN THE3UNDARBANS THEIR NUMBERSHAVEDWINDLEDDUETO ACCIDENTALCAPTUREINFISHINGNETS ANDOTHERFACTORS'AVIALSARE PROBABLYHEADINGFORREGIONAL EXTINCTION ALTHOUGHCAPTIVE BREEDINGPROGRAMSIN)NDIAAND .EPALAIMTOSAVETHESPECIES
SATELLITE VIEW
In this satellite view of part of the Ganges– Brahmaputra–Meghna delta, the Sundarbans Mangroves form the area that appears dark red. On the right is the Bay of Bengal.
135 PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Kinabatangan Mangroves PRINCIPAL SPECIES Stilt mangrove, long-fruited stilt mangrove, gray mangrove, nipa palm AREA 400 square miles (1,000 square km)
Southeast of Kota Kinabalu, eastern Sabah, Malaysia
LOCATION
Mangrove swamps occupy a coastal region of the Kinabatangan River delta, within eastern Sabah in the northern part of the island of Borneo. The mangrove swamps in this area form a complex mosaic with other types of lowland forest (including palm forest) and open reed marsh. They are home to dozens of species of saltwater fish, invertebrates such as shrimp and crabs, otters, and some 200 species of birds including various species of fish eagle, egret, kingfisher, and heron.
Irrawaddy dolphins are also occasionally spotted in the region, while other spectacular inhabitants include Borneo’s indigenous proboscis monkey and the saltwater crocodile (the world’s largest crocodile species), which was almost hunted to extinction but whose numbers are now recovering. Over the past 30 years, there has been extensive clearance of mangroves in the Kinabatangan delta for purposes of timber and charcoal production. The mangroves have either been replaced by oil palms or the cleared land has been developed for shrimp farming. Inevitably, the wildlife has suffered, but the government of Sabah is now engaged in a large-scale mangrove replanting operation. MANGROVE MONKEY
A female proboscis monkey, able to both swim and walk upright, is seen here with an infant, leaping across a waterway in the Kinabatangan mangroves. Her long tail helps to stabilize her movement through the air.
PACIFIC OCEAN EAST
Darien Mangroves
AERIAL ROOTS AT LOW TIDE
The mangroves are anchored in the soft mud by a dense network of roots that also provide a habitat for many animals.
PRINCIPAL SPECIES
Red, black, button, white, mora, and tea mangroves AREA 360 square miles (900 square km) LOCATION Southeast of Panama City on the Pacific coast of eastern Panama
The Darien mangrove swamps lie around estuaries in eastern Panama in the Darien National Park, adjacent to the Gulf of Panama. Here, the roots of mangroves create a haven for mollusks, crustaceans, and many fish species. Shrimp are particularly abundant— the larvae hatch offshore, migrate to the mangrove “nursery” for a few months, and then return to sea as adults. Some of the mangrove swamps in this region have been converted to shrimp ponds or farmland. Other threats include urbanization and pollution. BLACK MANGROVE PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
PRINCIPAL SPECIES Gray, long-fruited stilt, tallstilted, and cannonball mangroves AREA 4,000 square miles (10,000 square km)
Scattered areas around the island of New Guinea in the western Pacific
LOCATION
Mangrove swamps occur in extensive stretches on New Guinea’s coastline. The longest and deepest stretches are found on the south side of the island, around the mouths of large rivers such as the Digul, Fly, and Kikori rivers. Mangrove communities here are the most diverse in the world—more than 30 different species of mangroves have
relatively low. Two endemic species of bats and a species of monitor lizard are found here. Ten bird species are endemic, including the New Guinea flightless rail, two species of lory, the Papuan swiftlet, red-breasted paradisekingfisher, and red-billed brush-turkey. Although largely intact, the mangrove regions in the western part of New Guinea have recently come under threat of pollution from the rapidly expanding oil and gas industries. SEAHORSE
This small seahorse is adopting the yellow color of fallen mangrove leaves.
These black mangroves are in the Punta Patiño Nature Reserve, a private reserve owned by a nonprofit environmental group.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
New Guinea Mangroves
been found in a single swamp—and they form a vital habitat for a variety of animals living on the water’s edge. Underwater, over 200 different fish species, ranging from cardinal fish and mangrove jacks to seahorses and anchovies, have been recorded in either their adult or juvenile stages. Mudskippers (species of fish that can leave the water and climb trees), snails, and crabs climb the mangrove roots, while saltwater crocodiles patrol the channels between the mangrove stands. Although there are many species of fish and mangrove in these swamps, terrestrial animal diversity is
NEW GUINEA MANGROVES
This young saltwater crocodile is feeding among mangrove roots. Fully grown, this species is the largest of all crocodiles, growing up to 23 ft (7 m) long. Despite its name, it prefers fresh water, and adults compete fiercely for control of prime channels in swamps, often forcing juveniles into marginal rivers or out to the open sea.
THE SHALLOW SEAS that cover the
continental shelves around Earth’s landmasses nurture an extraordinary diversity of life. Energy from the Sun and nutrients from the land and sea ensure good conditions for plant growth, on which all marine life depends. The Moon is also a key player. Its gravitational pull drives the tides, which uncover the seashores each day, creating tidal currents that distribute plant nutrients and bring food to waiting animals. Each area of seabed provides a specific habitat for marine life that has adapted to the local conditions. The shallow seas comprise those parts of the oceans with which we are most familiar; yet we are only just beginning to understand the complexity of life there and its importance to the overall health of the planet.
SHALLOW SEA S CORAL REEFS
From polar seas to the tropics, the reflective surface of the sea hides a realm populated with unfamiliar life forms. Here in the tropics, animals look like plants, and plants hide inside the tissues of corals.
140
shallow seas
CONTINENTAL SHELVES CONTINENTAL SHELVES ARE ESSENTIALLY the flooded edges of continents, inundated by sea-level rise after the last ice age. The shelf seabed is now approximately 600 ft (200 m) below the surface, and its width varies, occasionally extending to hundreds of miles. The shelf seabed and water quality are influenced by land processes. Rivers bring fresh water and nutrients, making shelf waters very productive ecologically, while river-borne material settles on the seabed as sediment. The continental shelf has a huge diversity of marine life and habitats, but it is also the area of the sea that suffers most from pollutants.
FERTILE FRINGES
SHALLOW SEAWEED
Seaweeds grow best on shallow, sunlit rocks, thrive in strong water movement, and provide food and shelter for many small animals.
The coastal fringes have the greatest diversity of life in the oceans. Light penetration is highly variable, from turbid basins to clear tropical waters. In many places, enough light reaches the shallow sea bed for good growth of photosynthetic organisms. Seaweeds, seagrasses, and phytoplankton thrive here, fed by solar energy, nutrients from land, and sediments stirred up by winds and currents. The coastal fringes are much more productive than the open oceans. Combined with diverse habitats, this results in complex marine communities, making rich feeding and nursery grounds for animals from deeper water. In higher latitudes, seasonal variations in the Sun’s strength stimulate an annual cycle of plankton and seaweed growth. In the tropics, where seasons are less pronounced, seagrasses and seaweeds grow year-round.
DISCOVERY
&*/2$3 &JORDSAREDEEP SHELTEREDSEA INLETSORIGINALLYGOUGEDOUTBY GLACIERSANDTHENFLOODEDBYTHE SEA4HEYOFTENEXTENDMANY MILESINLANDANDAREMADEUPOF DEEPBASINS SEPARATEDFROMTHE OPENSEABYSHALLOWSILLS 4HISBASIN AND SILLSTRUCTURE HASAHUGEINflUENCEONMARINE LIFE)NTHISSHELTEREDENVIRONMENT STILL DARKSALTWATERLIESBENEATH PEATYFRESHWATER4HISMIMICS THEMARINECONDITIONSOFFTHE CONTINENTALSHELF ANDANIMALS NORMALLYCONfINEDTOMUCHDEEPER WATER SUCHASCOLD WATERCORALS INHABITWATERSHALLOWENOUGHFOR DIVERSTOEXPLORE
PRODUCTIVE PLAINS Much of the continental shelf is covered with deep sediments. Sand, gravel, and pebbles are deposited in shallow water, while fine mud is carried into deeper water offshore. An important part of shelf sediments is biogenic (made from the remains of living organisms). It consists of carbonates (chemical compounds containing carbon) derived from, for example, coral skeletons, and microscopic plankton. At first sight, sediment plains appear barren. However, many different animals live hidden beneath the surface, either permanently or emerging from burrows and tubes to feed and reproduce. Shifting sand and gravel is a difficult place to live, but more stable sediments occur on deeper sea beds.Varying particle size makes it suitable for constructing burrows and tubes, and it can contain huge numbers of animals, providing a rich food source. These animal communities are all sustained by plankton falling from the continental-shelf surface waters, and by the products of decomposition of seagrasses and seaweeds.
SEDIMENT PREDATORS
Fish and starfish are top predators on sediments, eating the many different animals on the surface or buried beneath. Fish catch a wide range of creatures, while starfish capture slower-moving prey.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
SHELF FISHERIES The waters and sea bed of the continental shelf support most of the world’s major fisheries. In coastal waters, there is planktonic food for larvae and cover for juveniles, and this is where QUEEN SCALLOP 90 percent of the world’s total seawater Scallops feed by filtering catch reproduces. Demersal fish (living on seawater, and can be collected by or just above the seabed) such as cod and diving, or farmed, with no damage haddock feed on seabed life. Pelagic to the marine environment. (open water) shoaling fish such as sardines and herring feed on zooplankton, and are important food for larger fish such as mackerel and sharks, as well as for cetaceans and seabirds. Commercially important invertebrates such as shrimp are caught in shelf waters. Worldwide, JUVENILE SHELTER coastal communities are sustained by These baby cod are feeding small-scale, inshore fisheries, which in horse mussel beds, before moving offshore as adults. catch a wide range of marine life.
141
SHELF DEPOSITS
The Mississippi River flows into the sea through a network of channels. As its silt-laden waters reach the sea, sediments fall out along the continental shelf.
GEOLOGY OF THE CONTINENTAL SHELF
#/!34!,0/,,54)/. &ORMANYYEARS COASTALSEASHAVE BEENUSEDASACONVENIENTDUMP FORHUMANWASTE%VENTHEMOST REMOTESEASHORESARENOWLITTERED WITHPLASTIC-OREINSIDIOUSIS INVISIBLEPOLLUTIONNUTRIENTSAND PATHOGENSFROMSEWAGEHEAVY METALS ORGANOHALOGENS ANDOTHER TOXINSFROMINDUSTRIALAND AGRICULTURALEFFlUENTSRADIOACTIVE WASTEFROMPOWERSTATIONSAND HYDROCARBONSFROMEFFlUENTS OIL SPILLS ANDOTHERSOURCES
DREDGED TREASURE
Metals such as gold, tin, rare earth elements, and aggregates for the building industry are extracted by dredging continental shelves.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
HUMAN IMPACT
Shelf deposits can be extremely thick. For example, those off eastern North America are up to 9 miles (15 km) deep, and have been accumulating and compacting for millions of years. A cross-section here reveals ancient sediments other than those deposited by rivers and glaciers, including carbonates, evaporites, and volcanic materials. Carbonates are largely produced by marine life in shallow tropical seas. Evaporites are salts resulting from seawater evaporation in shallow basins or on arid coastlines. Evaporite deposits create domes in overlying sedimentary rocks, trapping oil and gas.
142
shallow seas
ROCKY SEABEDS
ROCKY SLOPE
FROM THE WARM TROPICS TO COLD POLAR SEAS, many distinctive communities of marine life develop on the rocky floors of shallow seas. Underwater rocks provide points of attachment for both seaweeds and marine animals and are often covered with life. Seaweeds thrive in the sunlit shallows and provide a sheltered environment for animal communities. Firmly attached animals extend arms and tentacles to catch planktonic food from water currents, or pump water through their bodies to filter out nutrients. Mobile animals graze seaweeds or prey on fixed animals or each other. The life on a rocky reef depends on many environmental factors.
These underwater rocks in British Columbia, Canada, are covered with marine life. A sunstar and leather star search for prey among pink soft corals and sponges, while urchins graze below.
THE SEAWEED ZONE Seaweeds rely on sunlight for growth, and thrive only on the shallowest rocks. The depth in which they can grow depends on water clarity, from a few yards in turbid seas, to more than 330 ft (100 m) in the clearest waters. In colder waters, huge forests of kelp and other large brown seaweeds dominate the shallows, with smaller seaweeds in deeper water. Large seaweeds are often scarce on rocks in the tropics—instead, the Sun’s energy is harnessed by tiny unicellular algae inside coral tissues. Seaweeds harbor a plethora of associated animals. Some live permanently in the seaweed zone, while others use it as a breeding ground or nursery before moving into deeper water. BALLAN WRASSE FOOD SOURCE
Energy from sunlight captured by seaweeds is used by grazing animals. Here, green seaweeds cover rocks in Orkney, Scotland.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
2/#+'2!:%23 3EAURCHINSAREHIGHLYSUCCESSFUL MARINEINVERTEBRATES WELL DEFENDEDBYSHARPSPINES4HEY GRAZETHESEABED EATINGVIRTUALLY EVERYTHINGEXCEPTHARD SHELLED ANIMALSANDCORALLINESEAWEED CRUSTS4HEYHAVEAPROFOUND EFFECTONSEABEDCOMMUNITIES )FURCHINSAREABUNDANT THEYCAN SERIOUSLYREDUCETHEDIVERSITYOF LIFEONTHESEABED LEAVINGURCHIN ªBARRENS«#ONVERSELY WHERE URCHINSARESPARSE THEYCAN INCREASEDIVERSITY BYCLEARING SPACESFORNEWLIFETOSETTLE
In summer, adult ballan wrasses lay eggs in nests built of seaweed, secured in rock crevices. Young wrasses are often patterned, providing camouflage.
ANIMALDOMINATED DEEPS In deeper water, light levels are too low for most seaweeds, although encrusting red seaweeds need little light and grow farther down. Much of the plantlike growth in deeper water actually consists of fixed animals, which are most abundant in places with strong tidal currents. For mobile animals living here, the seabed is a minefield of toxic substances, released by fixed animals to deter predators. Below 160 ft (50 m), water movement from waves is much less, and fragile animals such as sponges and sea fans can grow to a large size. Here, and in places more sheltered from water movement, a smothering layer of fine silt continually settles on the rock surfaces, restricting the animal life to forms that can hold themselves above the rock or can remove the silt. On the most heavily silted rocks, animals may grow only on vertical or overhanging surfaces. ROCKY-BOTTOM PREDATOR
Stonefish have a textured skin and irregular shape, making them difficult to spot. A huge mouth engulfs prey, while the dorsal spines contain venom that can be fatal.
protruding eye used when hiding in sediment
dorsal spines with poison glands camouflage skin color and texture
large mouth tail fin
143
VERTICAL ROCK Underwater cliffs are often more heavily colonized with invertebrates than gently sloping rocks. In shallow water exposed to strong waves, various mobile seabed animals, particularly grazing sea urchins and predatory starfish, find it harder to cling to vertical and overhanging surfaces, and are knocked off by waves in rough weather.Vertical walls receive less sunlight, and are harder places for seaweed spores to settle, so there is less competition from seaweeds here than on horizontal rock. At sheltered sites, upward-facing rock is often covered with silt, and has few animals, but vertical and overhanging rock, by contrast, is silt-free and may have abundant life. Ledges and crevices in underwater cliffs provide safe refuges for fish and crustaceans.
JEWEL ANEMONES
Multicolored jewel anemones carpet vertical, wave-exposed rocks, with tentacles outstretched to catch food from the currents.
CREVICES AND CAVES Irregularities in underwater rock features can provide additional habitats for marine life. Crevices and small caves provide shelter for nocturnal fish that hide during the day and are active at night. Elongated fish are well shaped to live in crevices, while fish that are active by day need holes to hide in at night and when predators approach. Deep, dead-ended caves contain a range of habitats, from sunlit, wave-exposed entrances to dark, still inner waters and sheltered sediments. Shrimp and squat lobsters occupy cave ledges, while animals that actively pump water to feed live in the quiet water inside the cave and coat the walls. Flashlight fish hiding in caves during the day signal to each other with light produced by bacteria in organs beneath their eyes. Small crevices are important because they form a refuge for small animals from sea urchins. TAKING REFUGE
The flattened body of this spiny squat lobster enables it to retreat far into narrow crevices if threatened, and the spines help to wedge it in small spaces.
STORMS AND SCOUR
CORALLINE ALGAE
Like a coating of hard pink paint, encrusting coralline algae can withstand considerable scouring from nearby sand and pebbles.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Shallow rocky reefs take the full force of waves during storms, but rock-living animals and seaweeds on open, exposed coasts are firmly attached and are generally well-adapted to cope with pounding waves. Larger seaweeds and animals will be torn from shallower rocks, KEELWORMS making space for new life to settle, while many Keelworms have a hard, seaweeds and colonial animals can regrow from calcareous shell that protects holdfasts or basal parts. However, few animals or their bodies from sand scour. plants survive on rolling boulders or on bedrock scoured by nearby sand and pebbles. Where rock meets sand, there is often a band of bare, sandblasted rock. Just above, tough-shelled animals such as keelworms survive, together with patches of hard encrusting calcareous red seaweeds. Above this, fast-growing colonial animals such as sponges and barnacles can colonize in the intervals between storms.
144
shallow seas
SANDY SEABEDS MOST OF THE CONTINENTAL SHELF is covered with thick sediments, accumulated from millennia of land and coast erosion. The calcareous remains of marine life are continually added to the mix. Unlike deep-sea sediments (see pp.180-81), shelf sediments are stirred up by waves during storms, resuspending nutrients and profoundly affecting marine life and productivity. Sediments are largely the domain of animals, as seagrasses and seaweeds grow only in limited, shallow areas. Buried beneath the surface of a sandy seabed, there may be vast numbers of animals hiding from, or waiting for, prey. coarse bristles (chaetae) on sides
GRAVEL AND SAND
The coarsest sediments from coastal and land erosion are usually deposited inshore by rivers and glaciers as they enter the sea. Frequently shifted by waves and tides, clean, coarse sand and gravel make a difficult habitat; typical inhabitants include tough-shelled mollusks, sea cucumbers, burrowing urchins, and crabs. A wider range of organisms live in the more stable sand and gravel, where purple-pink beds of maerl can be found. This unattached, calcareous seaweed (see p.245) is made up of coral-like nodules. The open structure of SANDY HABITAT A marine segmented live maerl twiglets is ideal for sheltering tiny animals, newly settled the sea mouse from the plankton, while the dead maerl gravel underneath supports worm, lives in muddy sand. burrowing animals. Beds of seagrass and green seaweeds thrive in shallow sand, harboring a wide range of life. Embedded shells and stones provide anchors for various seaweed species. Many fish have adapted to life on sandy seabeds, the most familiar being flatfish. Shallow-water anglerfish wave their fishing lures to tempt prey within striking distance of their huge mouths, while garden eels live permanently in sand burrows, partly emerging to eat plankton. Sand eels and cleaver wrasse dive into the sand to avoid predators. GRAVEL DWELLER
This flame shell lives in a nest of gravel, pebbles, and shells. It pumps seawater through the nest, extracting food with its sticky, acidic tentacles.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
SOFT MUD In sheltered waters in enclosed bays, estuaries, and fjords, and in the deeper parts of the continental shelf, the finest particles of sediment settle as soft mud. Easily stirred up, the fine particles smother newly settled larvae and clog gills. There is little oxygen just below the mud surface, so buried animals must find ways to obtain oxygen from seawater. Despite these challenges, mud can be very productive. Bacteria and diatoms are often abundant on the mud surface, providing food for “vacuuming” animals such as echiuran worms. Stable burrows are more easily built in mud than in sand or gravel. Animals such as sea pens and burrowing anemones anchor themselves in the mud, raising sticky ANCHORED IN MUD polyps and tentacles This sea pen’s branches to catch the rain of are covered with small plankton or to ensnare a polyps that feed on the plankton. passing fish or crustacean.
feltlike dorsal chaetae
EXPLOITING SANDY BEDS
Stingrays are among the many animals that hide in the sand of the seabed; this southern stingray does so both to escape predators and to ambush prey.
MIXED SEDIMENTS Most sediments on the continental shelf are a mix of coarse and fine materials. An important part of these are calcareous fragments, derived from hard-shelled animals. Mixed sediments offer a wider range of building materials for tubes and burrows than sand or mud and are easier to traverse, so a far greater variety of animals live here. Seaweeds and hydroids cover the bed, attached to shells and pebbles.Visible life includes tube worms, burrowing anemones, and brittlestars; most of these withdraw into the sediment if threatened. Below the surface, hidden animals, including bivalves and LIFE ON THE SEDIMENT crustaceans, provide a rich Its mouth fringed by tentacles, this half-buried sea cucumber source of food for animals that (left) and a hermit crab inhabit can find and excavate it, such as these mixed sediments. starfish, crabs, and rays.
145
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DISCOVERY
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BENEATH THE SURFACE
SEDENTARY HABIT
This Norway lobster
lives in a U-shaped Wave-disturbed sand and gravel creates a mobile, with two well-oxygenated environment. Animals that live here, burrow exits and is mainly such as crustaceans and echinoderms, move through nocturnal. the shifting sand without building permanent homes. Animals that disturb sediments in this way, or by ingesting and defecating it, are called bioturbators and are important recyclers of nutrients. Less-disturbed sediments are inhabited by sediment stabilizers. These sedentary animals, many living in permanent burrows or tubes, can cope with oxygen depletion and being covered. Some strengthen their burrows by lining them with substances such as mucus and draw in seawater to supply food and oxygen. Others filter seawater or “vacuum” the sediment by extending their siphons to the surface. Microscopic creatures (the meiofauna) live in between the sand grains.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
3%!72%#+3
146
shallow seas
SEAGRASS BEDS AND KELP FORESTS are very different habitats, but both are highly productive and contribute significantly to the total primary production of inshore waters. Seagrasses are the only fully marine flowering plants. They thrive in shallow, sunlit water on sheltered, sandy seabeds, primarily in warm water. Kelps are large brown seaweeds that grow as dense forests on rocks of the lower shore and subtidal zone, preferring cold water. Both of these ecosystems have a complex structure and provide shelter for a COLD-WATER KELP Kelps are large brown wide range of associated animals and seaweeds, seaweeds that live mainly in some of them found nowhere else. shallow subtidal zones.
SEAGRASS BEDS AND KELP FORESTS
SEAGRASS BEDS
SEAGRASS MEADOWS
Seagrass meadows help to protect shallow sandy seabeds against erosion. NATURAL CAMOUFLAGE
This greater pipefish’s elongated shape and drab color make it hard to spot among seagrass leaves.
Seagrasses are the only flowering plants (angiosperms) that live entirely in the sea, and they grow best in shallow, sandy lagoons or enclosed bays, where the water clarity is good. They are also tolerant of variable salinity. Unlike seaweeds, seagrasses have roots, which they use to absorb nutrients from within the sediments, thus recycling nutrients that would otherwise be locked up below the surface. Their intertwined rhizomes and roots help to stabilize the sand, protecting against erosion and encouraging the buildup of sediments. The productivity and complex physical structure of seagrasses attract a considerable diversity of associated species, some of which are only found in seagrass beds. A variety of seaweeds and sedentary animals, including species of hydroids, bryozoans, and ascidians, grow on the leaves. Seagrasses are also a critically important food for animals such as manatees, dugongs, green turtles, and many aquatic birds.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
KELP FORESTS The term “kelp” was originally used to refer to the residue resulting from burning brown seaweeds, which was used in soap-making. It is now used more generally to refer to the many kinds of large brown seaweeds of the order Laminariales. Kelp forests grow best in colder waters, on shallow rocks with good water movement. The top DISTRIBUTION MAP edge of some kelp beds is visible at the lowest tides. Seagrass beds flourish in the tropics, while kelp forests Kelps grow densely on rock slopes down to around 30–70 ft (10–20 m) deep, depending on water clarity. In thrive in cold, nutrient-rich waters, extending into the deeper water, there is less light for photosynthesis and polar regions. kelps grow more sparsely; in most coastal waters they kelp forests cannot survive below 80 ft (25 m). In exceptionally seagrass beds clear water, kelps can grow at 160 ft (50 m). Many kelp species have gas-filled floats, which hold the fronds up to the light and away from grazers. Within the kelp forest, waves are subdued and many organisms live in its shelter. Although kelp habitats support rich marine communities, only about 10 percent of COASTAL DEFENSES kelp is eaten directly A band of giant kelp by animals; the rest can help to protect enters the food chain coasts from severe as detritus or dissolved storms by absorbing wave energy. organic matter.
HUMAN IMPACT
%.$!.'%2%$ '2!:%23 3EAGRASSESARETHEPRIMARYFOODOF GREENTURTLES ANDTHEONLYFOOD OFMANATEESANDDUGONGS 'LOBALLY THESEANIMALSARENOW ENDANGEREDORVULNERABLE THREATENEDBYTHEDESTRUCTIONOF THEIRFEEDINGGROUNDS4HECOASTAL AREASINWHICHSEAGRASSBEDSARE FOUNDAREOFTENVULNERABLETO POLLUTION2UNOFFOFNUTRIENTS ANDSEDIMENTSFROMLANDAFFECTS WATERCLARITY ANDISPROBABLYTHE BIGGESTTHREATWORLDWIDE
seagrass beds and kelp forests
KELP COMMUNITIES
NURSERIES AND REFUGES
Many kelps are treelike in shape, with a branched holdfast for attachment and a long stem (stipe), sometimes with floats, supporting a palmlike frond. This makes a kelp forest a multilayered environment in which different organisms live at different levels. Small spaces in the holdfast can KELP ANEMONE harbor hundreds of small animals from predators. This large anemone is unusually Some kelps have rough stipes covered with red mobile, and crawls or drifts up onto seaweed fronds to catch floating prey. seaweeds, although sea urchins and limpets may graze these in calm weather and in deeper water. Actively growing kelp fronds exude slime, which deters most animals from settling, but as growth slows later in the season, the fronds may become covered with a few species, particularly bryozoans, hydroids, and tube worms. These animals reduce the light reaching the fronds, and some kelps shed their fronds to get rid of unwanted settlers before growing new ones. The sea floor beneath the kelps may be covered with marine growth, or relatively barren if heavily grazed by sea urchins.
Seagrass beds and kelp forests are important refuges for young fish that need to hide from predators until they reach maturity. Many fish, such as the lumpsucker and swell shark, do not live among seagrasses or kelps as adults, but come into these habitats to spawn, giving their young a greater chance of survival. Small fish need small prey, and they find an abundance of food in the form of tiny worms, crustaceans, and mollusks among the seagrasses and in the sediment beneath, or in the undergrowth of kelp forests. These young fish are often unlike their parents, usually camouflaged in shades of green and brown to avoid detection. Some herbivorous fish from surrounding reefs come into seagrass beds only at night. Seagrass beds are important nurseries for some commercial invertebrates, including shrimp and cuttlefish.
BLUE-RAYED LIMPET
147
LUMPSUCKER
This baby lumpsucker is very vulnerable. However, it is well camouflaged on kelp fronds, to which it attaches itself with a sucker.
At the end of the growing season, these limpets move down into the holdfast to avoid being discarded with the old frond.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
DENSE KELP FOREST Giant kelp is the world’s biggest seaweed. Its stipes can be more than 100 ft (30 m) long, and it can grow as fast as 20 in (50 cm) per day.
148
shallow seas ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Laguna de Términos COASTAL TYPE
Shallow
lagoon WATER TYPE
Tropical
Sound of Barra Island chain with sounds
COASTAL TYPE WATER TYPE
Cool
PRIMARY VEGETATION
PRIMARY VEGETATION
Seagrasses, seaweeds, and mangroves
Seagrasses, maerl, and kelp
In the southwest of the Yucatán Peninsula, Campeche State, Mexico
LOCATION
LOCATION Between South Uist, Eriskay, and Barra, Outer Hebrides, Scotland, UK
Strong tidal currents flow through the Sound of Barra, and its clear, shallow waters and sandy sea floor provide an ideal habitat for the eelgrass Zostera marina. The eelgrass beds, together with beds of maerl (see p.245), are home to many species of small animals. Such rich, current-swept communities in this part of Scotland are threatened by the building of rock causeways across the sounds, which cut off the nutrient-
bearing currents that are essential for healthy growth. Eelgrass also grows in nearby brackish lagoons, together with the tasselweed Ruppia maritima, which is regarded by some scientists as a type of seagrass. Forests of the kelp Laminaria hyperborea grow on rocks at the edges of the sound, and these are home to abundant sea squirts and sponges.
SATELLITE VIEW, WITH LAGOON AT TOP
Two channels connect this sedimentladen lagoon to the Gulf of Mexico, while three rivers feed in fresh water, producing a pronounced change in salinity. The seagrasses Thalassia testudinum, Syringodium filiforme, and Halodule wrightii cover 29 percent of the lagoon. With 448 recorded animal species, Términos is the most speciesrich of Mexico’s four large lagoons.
ATLANTIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Falmouth Bay COASTAL TYPE
Rocky
with inlets WATER TYPE
Cool
PRIMARY VEGETATION
Laminaria hyperborea kelp, eelgrass LOCATION
Southwest Cornwall, England, UK
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
The coastline of Falmouth Bay includes two drowned river valleys (rias), the Fal and Helford, which are now long, sheltered sea inlets. Because of their rich marine life, these inlets,
EELGRASS STANDS
Healthy stands of eelgrass now thrive in the current-swept sound. Almost 90 percent of western Europe’s eelgrass was lost to a wasting disease in the 1930s.
together with part of Falmouth Bay, have been designated as a European marine Special Area of Conservation. Beds of the eelgrass Zostera marina and maerl (see p.245) in the inlets are home to a wide variety of animals, including the rare Couch’s goby. On the wave-exposed rocky coasts outside the inlets, the kelp Laminaria hyperborea grows in dense forests that support many associated seaweeds and animals. This kelp has a stiff stipe, which raises the frond off the sea bed and means that the forest has developed well vertically. On the rock beneath the kelp, there is competition for space among anemones, sponges, and smaller seaweeds, while other animals hide in kelp holdfasts. The kelp stipes have a rough surface and provide effective attachment points for red seaweeds, bryozoans, soft corals, and other types of encrusting animals. On the fronds, tiny blue-rayed limpets graze, and colorful sea slugs eat small hydroids and lacy bryozoans. In deeper water, the kelp Laminaria ochroleuca grows, close to its northern limit in Europe. This kelp is similar to Laminaria hyperborea, but has a smooth stipe on which little can grow. Two other kelps are found in the area, the sugar kelp (Laminaria saccharina), which has a crinkled frond, and furbelows (Saccorhiza polyschides), which has a large, hollow holdfast and grows up to 13 ft (4 m) long in just one season. CORNISH KELP FOREST
This forest of Laminaria hyperborea kelp has many different plants and animals living on the rocks beneath it, and on the kelp itself.
ATLANTIC OCEAN SOUTHEAST
Saldanha Bay Rocky and sandy bay with lagoon
SOUTH ATLANTIC KELP FOREST
On the west coast of South Africa, sea bamboo is the largest of the local kelps. It can grow as tall as 50 ft (15 m).
COAST TYPE
WATER TYPE
Cool
currents PRIMARY VEGETATION
Kelp and eelgrass LOCATION
Western Cape, South Africa
The cold Benguela Current flowing northward along the west coast of South Africa brings nutrient-rich water that is ideal for kelp growth, and sea bamboo (Ecklonia maxima)
is abundant in Saldhanha Bay. The smaller split-fan kelp (Laminaria pallida) becomes dominant in deeper water. South Africa is famous for its diversity of limpets, and the kelp limpet Cymbula compressa is found only on sea bamboo. Its shell fits neatly around the stipe, where it grazes. The highly endangered limpet Siphonaria compressa occurs only in the bay’s Langebaan Lagoon, grazing on the endemic eelgrass Zostera capensis.
seagrass beds and kelp forests
149
INDIAN OCEAN WEST
Gazi Bay Shallow bay and fringing reef
COASTAL TYPE WATER TYPE
Tropical
PRIMARY VEGETATION
Seagrasses and mangroves LOCATION
30 miles (50 km) south of Mombasa, Kenya
Gazi Bay’s shallow, subtidal mud and sand flats are sheltered by fringing coral reefs. Twelve species of seagrass grow on the mudflats, and these seagrass beds cover about half of the bay’s 6 square miles (15 square km). Mangrove-lined creeks flow into the bay, and this unusual proximity of mangrove, seagrass, and coral reef systems has led to scientific studies on how they interact. The seagrass beds proved to be important in trapping particles washed into the bay from the creeks. Most were trapped within 11/4 miles (2 km) of the mangroves. The seagrass beds provide food directly for shrimp larvae, zooplankton, shrimp, and oysters, and they are the main feeding grounds of all the fish in the bay, making them very important to the health of the local fisheries.
INDIAN OCEAN EAST
Lombok COASTAL TYPE
Semi-sheltered bays on rocky coast WATER TYPE
Tropical
PRIMARY VEGETATION
Seagrasses LOCATION
Lesser Sunda Islands, Indonesia
MANGROVES AND SEAGRASS
Unusually for mangrove-lined creeks, the water here is clear, and stands of seagrasses are able to flourish in the waterways leading into Gazi Bay.
At least 11,600 square miles (30,000 square km) of sea bed around Indonesia is covered by seagrasses. In the warm, shallow lagoons and bays, 12 species of seagrass flourish. Gerupuk Bay in the south of the island of Lombok contains 11 of the 12 Indonesian seagrass species, with Enhalus acoroides and Thalassodendron ciliatum forming dense stands. Analyses of the gut contents of fish that live among seagrass in Lombok’s waters
revealed that crustaceans were the dominant food source. However, a species of Tozeuma shrimp found there avoids the attention of predators by having an elongated body colored green with small white spots, a perfect camouflage against seagrass leaves. At low tide, local people use sharp iron stakes to dig for intertidal organisms, and this damages the seagrass leaves and roots, thereby threatening the survival of the beds.
HUMAN IMPACT
4(2%!4&2/- 4/52)34HEISLANDSOF3OUTHEAST!SIA CONTAINTHEGREATESTDIVERSITY OFSEAGRASSESINTHEWORLD BUT HUMANACTIVITYTHREATENSTHEMIN MANYPLACES4OURISMISAMEANS OFBRINGINGAMUCH NEEDEDBOOST TOMANYLOCALECONOMIESANDTHIS NECESSITATESTHEBUILDINGOFHOTELS ANDOTHERTOURISTFACILITIESIN PREVIOUSLYUNSPOILEDAREAS
Future tourist development in the region may threaten the Lombok seagrass beds as a result of pollution and loss of habitat through the building of beach facilities, such as marinas.
BAY OF PLENTY
The seagrass beds in Lombok’s bays are a source of seaweeds, sea urchins, sea cucumbers, mollusks, octopus, and milkfish for the area’s inhabitants.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
HOTEL DEVELOPMENT
150
shallow seas PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Sea of Japan/East Sea COASTAL TYPE
Mainly rocky WATER TYPE
Warm to cold PRIMARY VEGETATION
Kelp and seagrasses Off the west coast of the island of Hokkaido, northern Japan
LOCATION
The Sea of Japan/East Sea is influenced by the warm Tsushima Current from the south and the cold Liman Current from the north, so its marine flora is a rich mix of temperate and cold-water species because of the wide range of water temperatures in different parts of the coast. The mixing of these currents also provides plentiful nutrients for plant growth. Seagrass diversity is moderate, but eelgrasses are particularly well represented with
seven species, several of them endemic to the area. Kelps are also diverse, with species of Undaria, Laminaria, and Agarum thriving in the colder waters in the north. Kelp is highly nutritious, and Hokkaido is the traditional center of kelp harvesting. INVASIVE KELP
Since 1981, Asian kelp (Undaria pinnatifida) has spread from its indigenous sites in Japan, China, and Korea to four continents.
FEMALE RED PIGFISH IN KELP FOREST
PACIFIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Poor Knights Islands COASTAL TYPE
Offshore
islands WATER TYPE
Temperate
PRIMARY VEGETATION
Kelp and other brown seaweeds LOCATION Off the east coast of Northland, North Island, New Zealand
In 1981, a marine reserve was set up around the Poor Knights Islands, extending 2,600 ft (800 m) out from the shore. The area is popular with divers for its caves and kelp forests. In the most exposed places, the kelp Lessonia variegata is predominant, while at more sheltered sites Ecklonia radiata is more abundant, together with the large brown seaweed Carpophyllum flexuosum. Large numbers of sea urchins dominate in some places.
PACIFIC OCEAN NORTHEAST
Izembek Lagoon Rocky coast and lagoon
COASTAL TYPE WATER TYPE
Cold; low
salinity PRIMARY VEGETATION
Eelgrass and kelp On the northern side of the Alaskan Peninsula, Alaska, US LOCATION
SEAGRASS BANKS
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
INDIAN OCEAN EAST
Shark Bay has one of the world’s largest seagrass beds, covering about 1,500 square miles (4,000 square km).
Shark Bay Shallow, semi-enclosed bay
COASTAL TYPE
LOCATION
food for one of the world’s largest populations of dugongs (see p.423), which are preyed on by sharks. The adjacent Hamelin Pool is too salty for seagrasses, but it is well known for the growth of stromatolites (see p.232).
Shark Bay is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and it contains one of the largest, most diverse seagrass beds in the world. Its 12 species of seagrass, which include Amphibolis antarctica and Posidonia australis, dominate the subtidal zone to depths of about 40 ft (12 m). The vast seagrass beds provide
POSIDONIA AUSTRALIS
WATER TYPE
Tropical;
high salinity PRIMARY VEGETATION
Seagrasses Inlet of the Indian Ocean, north of Perth, Western Australia
Izembek Lagoon covers 150 square miles (388 square km) of the Izembek State Game Refuge and is the site of one of the world’s largest eelgrass beds. The eelgrass Zostera marina grows in dense beds here, both subtidally and on intertidal flats, where it is grazed by wading birds at low tide. Over half a million geese, ducks, and shorebirds
stop over at the lagoon during migration to refuel on the eelgrass. On the rocky, open coasts outside the lagoon, kelp forests thrive in the cold water. The most common forestforming kelp here is bull kelp (Nereocystis luetkeana), which can grow to 130 ft (40 m) in length. Bull kelp is an annual, which means that it reaches maturity within a single year. It grows quickly, at a rate of up to 5 in (13 cm) per day. The huge fronds, which have many long, strap-shaped blades, are supported by gas-filled bladders (pneumatocysts) that are up to 6 in (15 cm) in diameter. FEEDING GROUNDS
After raising their young farther north, thousands of Brant geese graze on eelgrass in Izembek Lagoon in the fall before flying south to Baja California, Mexico.
151 PACIFIC OCEAN EAST
Monterey Bay Kelp Forest COASTAL TYPE
Rocky and sandy WATER TYPE
Cool to warm PRIMARY VEGETATION
Kelp LOCATION
South of San Francisco, California, US
The California coast is famous for its beds of giant kelp (Macrocystis pyrifera), the largest seaweed on the planet (see p.240). It forms dense forests just offshore, and in Monterey Bay it outcompetes bull kelp for sunlight in many places, but the latter dominates in more exposed areas. Inshore of these giant species, other smaller kelps thrive. The kelp forests provide a unique habitat. Sea otters (see p.406), which live among the kelp forests and eat sea urchins, are thought to be important in controlling the urchins, which graze on the kelp. Seagrasses of the genus Phyllospadix are also found in Monterey Bay. Unusually for seagrasses, they can attach to rock, and grow in the surf zone or in intertidal pools on rocky coasts. Each year over 140,000 tons of giant kelp are harvested in California for the extraction of alginates, which are used in the textile, food, and medical industries.
In exceptional circumstances, giant kelp can be 265 ft (80 m) long. The forests are at their thickest in late summer, and decline during the dark winter months.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
SUNLIT FOREST
152
shallow seas CORAL DIVERSITY
CORAL REEFS
In this seascape off a Fijian island, groups of shoaling sea goldies hover over diverse species of coral, sponges, and other reef organisms.
built from the remains of small marine organisms, principally a group of colony-forming animals called stony (or hard) corals. Reefs cover about 100,000 square miles (300,000 square km) of the world’s shallow marine areas, growing gradually as the organisms that form their living surfaces multiply, spread, and die, adding their limestone skeletons to the reef. Coral reefs are among the most complex and beautiful of Earth’s ecosystems, and are home to a fantastic variety of animals and other organisms; but they are also among the most heavily utilized and economically valuable. Today, the world’s reefs are under pressure from numerous threats to their health.
CORAL REEFS ARE SOLID STRUCTURES
TYPES OF REEFS
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Coral reefs fall into three main types: fringing reefs, barrier reefs, and atolls. The most common are fringing reefs. These occur adjacent to land, with little or no separation from the shore, and develop through upward growth of reef-forming corals on an area of continental shelf. Barrier reefs are broader and separated from land by a stretch of water, called a lagoon, that can be many miles wide and dozens of yards deep. Atolls are large, ring-shaped reefs, enclosing a central lagoon; most atolls are found well away from large landmasses, such as in the South Pacific. Parts of the reef structure in both atolls and barrier reefs often protrude above sea level as low-lying coral islands—these develop as wave action deposits coral fragments broken off from the reef itself. Two other types of reefs are patch reefs—small structures found within the lagoons of other reef types—and bank reefs, comprising various reef structures that have no obvious link to a coastline.
FRINGING REEF
BARRIER REEF
ATOLL
A fringing reef directly borders the shore of an island or large landmass, with no deep lagoon.
A barrier reef is separated from the coast by a lagoon. In this aerial view, the light blue area is the reef and the distant dark blue area is the lagoon.
An atoll is a ring of coral reefs or coral islands enclosing a central lagoon. It may be elliptical or irregular in shape.
coral grows on shoreline, forming fringing reef
island subsides when volcano has become inactive
sea level
BARRIER REEF
FRINGING REEF
lagoon volcanic island
ATOLL FORMATION
An atoll is shown here forming around a volcanic island. First, the island’s shore is colonized by corals forming a fringing reef (above). Over time, the island subsides, but coral growth continues, forming a barrier reef (above right). Finally, the island disappears, but the coral maintains growth, forming an atoll (right). Atolls can also form as a result of sea-level rise.
lagoon of shallow water
reef face ATOLL
coral continues to grow, forming barrier reef volcanic island becomes submerged central area filled by reef limestone coral continues to grow where waves bring food
coral reefs
153
REEF FORMATION The individual animals that make up corals are called polyps. The polyps of the main group of reef-building corals, stony corals, secrete limestone, building on the substrate underneath. The polyps also form colonies that create community skeletons in a variety of shapes. An important contributor to the life of these corals is the presence within the polyps of tiny organisms called zooxanthellae, which provide much of the polyps’ nutritional needs. Other organisms that add their skeletal remains to the reef include mollusks and echinoderms. Grazing and boring organisms also contribute, by breaking coral skeletons into sand, which fills gaps in the developing reef. Algae and other encrusting organisms help bind the sand and coral fragments together. Most reefs do not grow continuously but experience spurts of growth interspersed with quieter periods, which are sometimes associated with recovery from storm damage. STONY CORAL
This group of branching hard corals is growing at a depth of about 16 ft (5 m) off the coast of eastern Indonesia. Individual stony corals can grow up to a few inches per year.
OPEN POLYPS
At the center of each polyp is an opening, the mouth, which leads to an internal gut. The tissue around the gut secretes limestone, which builds the reef.
DISTRIBUTION OF REEFS Stony corals can grow only in clear, sunlit, shallow water where the temperature is at least 64˚F (18˚C), and preferably 77–84˚F (25–29˚C). They grow best where the average salinity of the water is 36 ppt (parts per thousand) and there is little wave action or sedimentation from river runoff. These conditions occur only in some tropical and subtropical areas.The highest concentration of coral reefs is found in the Indo-Pacific region, which stretches from the Red Sea to the central Pacific. A smaller concentration of reefs occurs around the Caribbean Sea. In addition to warmwater reefs, awareness is growing about other corals that do not depend on sunlight, and form deep, cold-water reefs—some of them outside the tropics (see p.178). WARM-WATER REEF AREAS
The conditions needed for the growth of warm-water coral reefs are found mainly within tropical areas of the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. The reefs are chiefly in the western parts of these oceans, where the waters are warmer than in the eastern areas.
#/2!,",%!#().' "LEACHINGREFERSTOCOLORLOSSIN REEF BUILDINGCORALSANDOCCURS WHENTHETINYORGANISMSCALLED ZOOXANTHELLAE WHICHGIVECORALS THEIRCOLORS AREEJECTEDFROMCORAL POLYPSORLOSETHEIRPIGMENT)N EXTREMECASES THISCANLEADTOTHE CORALSDEATH6ARIOUSSTRESSES CANCAUSEBLEACHING INCLUDING POLLUTIONANDOCEANTEMPERATURE RISES)NRECENTDECADES SEVERAL MASSBLEACHINGEVENTSHAVEBEEN RECORDED AFFECTINGCORALSOVER WIDEAREASOFOCEAN
This species, Lophelia pertusa, is one of a few of the reef-forming corals that grow in cold water, at depths to 1,650 ft (500 m).
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
HUMAN IMPACT
COLD-WATER CORAL
154
shallow seas REEF CREST
PARTS OF A REEF
In front of the reef crest (the uppermost, seaward part of a reef), spurs of coral sometimes grow out into the sea, separated by grooves.
Distinct zones exist on coral reefs, each with characteristic levels of light intensity, wave action, and other parameters. Each zone’s characteristics determine the organisms that live there. The reef slope, or forereef, is the part that faces the sea. The upper parts of the reef slope are dominated by branching coral colonies and intermediate depths by massive forms. These are the areas of the reef with the greatest diversity of species. At the top of the reef slope is the reef crest. This takes the brunt of the wave action and is subject to high light levels. Shoreward of the reef crest is the reef flat, a shallow, relatively flat expanse of limestone, sand, and coral fragments that may become exposed at high tide. The number of corals decreases toward the shore. Barrier reefs and atolls have a final zone, the lagoon area.
sea urchin
crinoid
elkhorn coral staghorn coral maze coral
SPECIES DIVERSITY In addition to reef-building corals, the warm, sunny waters of a reef are populated by a huge variety of other animals as well as seaweeds. The richest and healthiest reefs are home to thousands of species of fish and other marine vertebrates, such as turtles, while all the major groups of invertebrate animals are also represented. These include sponges, worms, anemones, and non-reef-building corals (such as sea fans), crustaceans, mollusks (which include snails, clams, and octopuses), and echinoderms (sea urchins and relatives). Every nook and cranny of a reef is used by some animal as a hiding place and shelter. All the organisms in the reef are part of a complex web of relationships. Many organisms are also involved in mutualistic partnerships with other organisms, in which both species benefit. tube sponge
sea fan
star coral
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
QUEEN ANGEL FISH
One of hundreds of fish species found on the Caribbean reefs, this juvenile angelfish feeds on small crustaceans and algae.
lettuce coral
REEF ZONES
The structure of a typical fringing reef, including forereef, reef crest, and reef flat, and some of the sea life that inhabits it, are shown here. The forereef has three zones, which are dominated by different coral forms: branching coral, massive coral, and platy coral. Individual corals are not shown to scale.
platelike star coral finger coral sea whip
TUBE SPONGES
Different species of sponges are found in many parts of the reef, including caves and cavities, as well as on the open reef slope.
PLATY CORAL ZONE Corals in this deep, dark part of the forereef expand horizontally to capture maximum sunlight, forming platelike colonies.
coral reefs
155
THE IMPORTANCE OF REEFS beach small brain coral
SEA URCHIN
Sea urchins graze on algae and are important in preventing algal overgrowth on coral reefs.
seagrass
golf ball coral
sea anemone
Coral reefs are of inestimable value for many reasons. First, they provide a protective barrier around islands and coasts: without the reefs, these would erode away into the ocean. Second, reefs are highly productive, creating more living biomass than any other marine ecosystem and providing an important food source for many coastal peoples. Third, they support more species per square unit area than any other marine environment. In addition to known coral-reef species, scientists estimate that there may be several million undiscovered species of organisms living in and around coral reefs. This biodiversity may be vital in finding new medicines for the 21st century—many reef organisms contain biochemically potent substances that are being studied as possible cures for arthritis, cancer, and other diseases. Finally, because of their outstanding beauty, reefs contribute to local economies through tourism, particularly attracting snorkelers and scuba-diving enthusiasts (see p.474).
REEF FISHING
Small-scale fishing using hand nets, often transported to a suitable site by canoe, is common throughout the Indian and Pacific oceans, as shown here off Pantar Island in eastern Indonesia.
SAND AND ALGAL ZONE This area is dominated by sand and seagrass, which may harbor small marine life.
REEF FLAT The animals living here must be able to endure high temperatures and salinity.
REEF CREST The corals inhabiting this zone are invariably robust, as they must withstand energetic wave action.
crinoid arm
#/2!,0/)3/.).'
GOLDEN CRINOID
Crinoids, or feather stars, are related to starfish. They usually live in a hole or other shelter on the reef, extending their elegant arms to catch food.
algae
VULNERABLE REEFS BRANCHING CORAL ZONE This zone is just below the reef crest and is dominated by corals with branching forms, such as staghorn coral.
SUBMARINE STUDY
Here researchers record the frequency of algal species on a reef in the Hawaiian Islands, using a camera, a frame for delineating areas of reef, and underwater writing implements.
Many types of stress can damage reefs and are doing so on a massive scale. Much of the harm is caused by human activity, including coastal pollution, uncontrolled development of coasts, and diving tourism. Other problems include collection of corals and reef organisms for the aquarium and jewelry trades, uncontrolled mining of reefs for building materials, and destructive fishing practices. Natural disturbances include tropical storms and mass die-offs of animals that help to maintain reef health. Coral bleaching, linked to rises in sea temperatures (see p.153), is particularly worrisome. Coral reefs can recover from periodic natural traumas, but if they are subjected to multiple sustained stresses, they perish. It has recently been estimated that two-thirds of the world’s warm-water reefs are at risk of disappearing in the near future.
/NEOFTHEMOSTDESTRUCTIVE fISHINGPRACTICES LIABLETOKILL CORALSOVERWIDEAREASOFREEF INVOLVESTHEUSEOFPOISONTO HELPCATCHTROPICALfISHFORTHE AQUARIUMTRADE4HISISPRACTICED INPARTSOF3OUTHEAST!SIASUCHAS THE0HILIPPINES4HEYOUNGBOY PHOTOGRAPHEDBELOW SWIMMING ATADEPTHOFABOUTFTM CARRIESACATCHBAG NET ANDA SQUIRTBOTTLECONTAININGASOLUTION OFSODIUMCYANIDE4HECYANIDE ISUSEDTOIMMOBILIZESELECTED REEFfISH MAKINGTHEMEASIERTO CATCH BUTKILLSALLTHELIVINGCORALS THATITCOMESINCONTACTWITH TAKINGATERRIBLETOLLONTHEHEALTH OFTHEREEF
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
MASSIVE CORAL ZONE This central part of the forereef is usually dominated by massive corals—that is, colonies with rounded shapes.
HUMAN IMPACT
156
shallow seas BOILER REEFS
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Bermuda Platform Atoll with fringing and patch reefs TYPE
AREA 150 square miles (370 square km)
Localized areas of damage
CONDITION
Northwest Atlantic, extending west and north of the islands of Bermuda
LOCATION
The Bermuda Platform is the elliptical, flattened summit of a huge volcanic submarine mountain (seamount) in the northwest Atlantic. Its surface lies 45–60 ft (14–18 m) below sea level and is covered in a thick layer of limestone, formed over millions of years from the
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
Florida Reef Tract TYPE
Barrier reef, patch
reefs AREA 400 square miles (1,000 square km)
remains of corals and other organisms growing on the platform. Along the platform’s southern and eastern edges, limestone sand has gradually built up to form the Bermuda islands. Coral reefs are present around the other edges of the platform, forming an atoll, while patch reefs grow on its central surface. The diversity of reef flora and fauna here is less than that associated with the reefs in the Caribbean Sea to the south. the past 30 years, mainly due to human impact. Live coral cover has decreased, coral diseases have become extensive, inhabitants that were once common (such as the queen conch) have virtually disappeared, and the area of reef encroached on by mats
Degraded; some recent recovery
From offshore Miami Beach to south of Key West, Florida, US
LOCATION
This system of coral reefs is 160 miles (260 km) long and curves to the east and south of the Florida Keys. Some geologists classify it as a barrier reef, others as a barrier-like collection of bank reefs. It is the largest area of coral reefs in the US and has a high biodiversity, being home to about 60 species of stony coral, 1,300 species of mollusk, and 500 species of fish. The reefs’ health has declined over
Bahama Banks TYPE Fringing reefs, patch reefs, barrier reef AREA 1,200 square miles (3,150 square km) CONDITION
Generally
healthy Bahamas, southeast of Florida, US, and northeast of Cuba
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LOCATION
Lighthouse Reef TYPE
Atoll with patch
reefs
CONDITION
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
ATLANTIC OCEAN WEST
These small reefs, close to the surface, are called “boilers” after their frothy appearance when waves break on them.
AREA 120 square miles (300 square km) CONDITION
LOCATION Western Caribbean, 60 miles (80 km) east of central Belize
Nevertheless, 21 different species of stony coral, 17 species of soft (non-reef-building) coral, including many spectacular purple sea fans, and about 120 different species of fish have been recorded here. of algae has expanded. Causes of this degradation include overfishing, fertilizer runoff from south Florida, sedimentation onto the reefs as a result of dredging, and sewage pollution from boats. Other contributing factors include hurricane damage, declines in algae-grazing sea urchins, and direct damage from diveboat anchors and ship groundings. Steps are being taken to reverse the decline, with some signs of success.
CARYSFORT REEF
Carysfort Reef, part of the Florida Reef Tract, lies close to Key Largo and is the site of many ancient shipwrecks.
The Bahamas is an archipelago of some 700 islands scattered over two limestone platforms, the Little Bahama and Great Bahama Banks, in the West Indies. The platforms have been accumulating for at least 70 million years—the Great Bahama Bank is over 15,000 ft (4,500 m) thick—yet their surfaces remain 33–80 ft (10–25 m) below sea level. Many of the islands have fringing coral reefs; there are also many patch reefs on the Banks and a
Generally
healthy
barrier reef near the island of Andros. The reefs are home to a range of corals and coral reef-dwelling animals that is typical for the western tropical Atlantic. Although local declines in coral cover and occasional outbreaks of coral disease have been recorded, the reefs are generally healthy. There has been concern about overgrowth of algae, but for now the algae are being kept in check by a thriving population of parrotfish, which graze the reefs.
HARD AND SOFT CORALS
This diverse group of corals, including a large purple sea fan, was photographed off the island of New Providence.
Lighthouse Reef is an atoll lying 35 miles (55 km) east of the huge Belize barrier reef, off the coast of central Belize. It is roughly ovalshaped, about 23 miles (38 km) long, and 5 miles (8 km) wide on average.
coral reefs Like all atolls, it is bounded by a ringlike outer structure of coral formations, many of which break the surface. These form a natural barrier against the sea and surround a lagoon, which sits on top of a mass of limestone. The lagoon is relatively deep but contains numerous patch reefs along with six small, sandy, low-lying islands, or cays (one containing a dive center). At its center is Lighthouse Reef ’s most remarkable feature—a large, almost circular sinkhole in the limestone, known as the Great Blue Hole. Approximately 480 ft (145 m) deep, this feature formed some 18,000 years ago during the last ice age, when much of Lighthouse Reef was above sea level. At that time, freshwater erosion
produced a complex of air-filled caves and tunnels in the limestone. At some point, the ceiling of one of the caves collapsed, producing what is now the entrance to the Blue Hole. Later, as sea level rose, the cave complex flooded, and it is now accessible only by adventurous scuba divers. Apart from the Blue Hole, the atoll boasts large areas of healthy, abundant, mainly unexplored coral formations. As well as patch reefs within the atoll, around its margins are many spectacular coral-encrusted walls (dropoffs) that descend to depths of several hundred yards. Lighthouse Reef exhibits a biological diversity typical of the region; it is home to some 200 fish species and 60 species of stony corals.
157
HUMAN IMPACT
$)6).'4(%'2%!4",5%(/,% 4HE'REAT"LUE(OLEISONEOF THEWORLDSMOSTEXCITINGDIVE SITES)TISNOTRECOMMENDEDFOR THEFAINTHEARTEDASSHARKSARE COMMONLYENCOUNTERED ORFOR NOVICEDIVERSBECAUSEPERFECT BUOYANCYCONTROLISNEEDED !TFTM DEPTH ANARRAYOF IMPRESSIVEANCIENTSTALACTITESCAN BESEENHANGINGFROMTHESLANTING WALLSOFTHEHOLE4HEENTRANCETO ASYSTEMOFCAVESANDTUNNELSLIES AFEWYARDSFARTHERDOWN
The water in this sinkhole descends to a depth of 480 ft (145 m), producing the deep blue color after which it is named.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
GREAT BLUE HOLE
158
shallow seas INDIAN OCEAN NORTHWEST
Red Sea Reefs TYPE Fringing, patch, and barrier reefs; atolls AREA 6,300 square miles (16,500 square km)
Generally good; localized damage
CONDITION
Red Sea coasts of Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Eritrea, and Yemen
LOCATION
The Red Sea contains arguably the richest, most biologically diverse, and most spectacular coral reefs outside Southeast Asia. The coral reefs in the northern and southern areas of the sea differ considerably. In much of the northern section, the coasts shelve extremely steeply and there are few offshore islands. The coral reefs here are mainly narrow fringing reefs, with reef flats typically only a few yards wide, and slopes that plunge steeply toward the sea floor. In the south, off Eritrea and southwestern Saudi Arabia, is a much wider area of shallow continental shelf. Many of the reefs
INDIAN OCEAN NORTHWEST
Aldabra Atoll TYPE
Atoll
60 square miles (155 square km) AREA
Excellent, although it has suffered some coral bleaching
CONDITION
Western extremity of the Republic of Seychelles archipelago, northwest of Madagascar
LOCATION
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
At 20 miles (34 km) long and 9 miles (14.5 km) wide, Aldabra is the largest raised coral atoll in the world. The term “raised” refers to the fact that the
in this area surround offshore islands, and there are fewer steep dropoffs. The southern Red Sea also receives a continuous inflow of water from the Gulf of Aden to its south that is high in nutrients and plankton, making the waters more turbid, or cloudy, which restricts reef development. Live coral cover throughout the Red Sea reefs is generally high, at about 60–70 percent, as is the diversity of stony and soft corals, fish (including the famous Red Sea lionfish), and other reef organisms. More than 260 different species of stony coral have been identified in the central Red Sea. Although the Red Sea reefs are mainly healthy, intense diving tourism, especially in parts of Egypt, has caused severe local damage. Coral predation by the crown-of-thorns starfish has also been a problem, and there is a threat of oil spillages from tankers heading toward the Suez Canal. GULF OF AQABA REEF
Groups of little red fish of the genus Anthias fluttering around hard coral heads, or colonies, are a familiar sight on Red Sea reefs.
limestone structures forming its rim, which originated from coral reefs, have grown into four islands that protrude as much as 27 ft (8 m) above sea level. Situated on top of an ancient volcanic pinnacle, the islands enclose a shallow lagoon, which partially empties and then fills again twice a day with the tides. Because of its remote location, and its status as a Special Nature Reserve and (since 1982) UNESCO World Heritage Site, Aldabra has escaped the worst of the stresses that human activities have placed on most of the world’s coral reefs. Although, in common with many Indian Ocean locations, the atoll was affected by
a severe coral bleaching event in 1997–98, its external reefs are in a near-pristine state. They are rich in marine life, featuring large schools of reef fish, green and hawksbill turtles, forests of yellow, pink, and purple seafans, groupers, hammerhead sharks, and barracuda. The atoll’s inner lagoon contains numerous healthy patch reefs, is fringed by mangrove swamps, and is inhabited by turtles, parrotfish, and eagle rays. On land, Aldabra is famous for its giant tortoises, rare exotic birds such as the flightless rail, and giant robber crabs, which have claws big enough to crack open coconuts.
INDIAN OCEAN WEST
Bazaruto Archipelago Fringing reefs, patch reefs
TYPE
AREA 60 square miles (150 square km)
Generally good; some damage
CONDITION
LOCATION Southeastern coast of Mozambique, northeast of Maputo
The Bazaruto Archipelago is a chain of sparsely populated islands on the coast of Mozambique, formed where sand was deposited over hundreds of thousands of years by the Limpopo River. A Marine National Park, established in 2001, covers most of the archipelago, protecting its impressive fringing reefs and kaleidoscopic range of marine life. More than 2,000 fish species, 100 species of stony corals, and 27 dazzling soft-coral species, including unusual “green tree” corals, are found on Bazaruto’s reefs, as well as eagle rays, manta rays, and five species of turtles. The archipelago is also a refuge for one of the remaining populations of dugongs (see p.423) in the western Indian Ocean. REEF SAFARI
A peaceful way of visiting the shallow, crystal-clear waters around the Bazaruto reefs is on a dhow, as part of a reef safari.
MUSHROOM ROCK
Strong tidal flows of ocean water into and out of Aldabra’s lagoon have sculpted some raised clumps of old reef into mushroom-shaped islets known as champignons.
159 INDIAN OCEAN CENTRAL
Diego Garcia Atoll TYPE
Atoll
17 square miles (44 square km) AREA
Generally good; recovering from coral bleaching in 1998
CONDITION
INDIAN OCEAN CENTRAL
TYPE
The numerous ringlike structures in this aerial view are faros—mini-atolls within a larger Maldivian atoll.
Atolls, fringing
reefs AREA 3,500 square miles (9,000 square km)
Recovering from coral bleaching
CONDITION
LOCATION
Chagos Archipelago, south of Sri Lanka, central Indian Ocean
LOCATION Off southern India, southwest of Sri Lanka, in the Indian Ocean
This atoll, best known as a US military base, is also home to one of the world’s largest populations of breeding sea birds. The atoll is unusual in that its coral limestone-based rim, raised above sea level, is a single island that runs almost completely round the central lagoon, which is 65–100 ft (20–30 m) deep. The reefs within the lagoon and around the atoll’s edges are home to 220 species of stony coral.
The Maldives are a group of 26 atolls, many of them very large, in the Indian Ocean. The majority are composed of numerous separate reefs and coralline islets (some 1,200 in all), arranged in ringlike structures. Within most of the atoll lagoons, which are 60–180 ft (18–55 m) in depth, there are usually many patch reefs and numerous structures called faros, which are rare outside the Maldives. These look like mini-atolls and consist of roughly elliptical reefs with a central lagoon. Most of the Maldivian atolls are themselves arranged in a large, elliptical ring, some 500 miles (800 km) long and 60 miles (100 km) wide. The reefs that fringe all the Maldivian atolls, islets, and faros contain more than 200 species of colorful stony coral, more than 1,000 different fish species, and are abundant in other marine life. Groupers, snappers, and sharks, for example, are frequently encountered. In 1998, a severe coral bleaching event killed up to 90 percent of the corals in some areas, and had a strong negative impact on diving and snorkeling tourism. By early 2006, however, some areas were effectively recolonizing with corals.
WESTERN SIDE OF DIEGO GARCIA
ATOLLS WITHIN ATOLLS
Maldives
HUMAN IMPACT
!4/,,#)49 -ALE THE-ALDIVESCAPITALCITY COVERSTHEENTIRESURFACEAREAOFA CORALISLANDTHATFORMSPARTOFAN ATOLLRIM)TSREEFHASBEENMINED TOPROVIDEBUILDINGMATERIALSFOR ARTIFICIALLYEXTENDINGTHEISLAND
INDIAN OCEAN NORTHEAST
Andaman Sea Reefs TYPE
Fringing reefs
2,000 square miles (5,000 square km) AREA
Some areas poor due to coral bleaching, diver damage
CONDITION
LOCATION Andaman Sea coasts: Thailand, Myanmar, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Malaysia, Sumatra
SOFT CORAL COLONIES
These soft corals and glass fish, which are almost transparent, were photographed off southwest Thailand.
and breeding grounds for endangered sea turtles. A coral bleaching event in 1998 badly damaged reefs around the Andaman and Nicobar islands, which until then were some of the most pristine anywhere, but hardly touched the Thailand reefs. The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami caused relatively little damage. Other threats to these reefs include collection of marine life for aquariums, destructive fishing techniques, siltation caused by poorly managed deforestation on some of the islands, and anchor damage from dive boats.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Most Andaman Sea reefs are fringing reefs around islands off the coasts of Thailand and Myanmar or, in the northwest, off the eastern coasts of the Andaman and Nicobar islands—the site of the largest continuous area of reefs in south Asia. About 200 coral species and more than 500 fish species have been recorded here. The reefs and islands are also important feeding
4HEPARTLYDISMANTLEDREEFLEAVES THEISLANDPOORLYPROTECTEDFROM STORMS SOASEAWALLHASBEENBUILT AROUNDMUCHOFITSPERIMETER PREVENTINGMAJORDAMAGEDURING THE)NDIAN/CEANTSUNAMI
160
shallow seas PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Shiraho Reef TYPE
Fringing reef
4 square miles (10 square km) AREA
Reasonable; recovering from severe coral bleaching in 1998
CONDITION
Southeast coast of Ishigaki Island, at the southwestern extremity of Japanese archipelago
LOCATION
Shiraho Reef, off Ishigaki Island, part of the Japanese archipelago, came to notice in the 1980s as an outstanding example of biodiversity, with some 120 species of coral and 300 fish
species concentrated in a few square miles. The reef also contains the world’s largest colony of rare blue ridge coral (Heliopora coerulea). For decades, environmentalists have battled to save the reef from the building of a new airport for Ishigaki. A proposal to construct the airport on top of the reef was dropped, but concern remains over plans to build it on land, as soil runoff and sedimentation in the reef area is likely to have an adverse effect. BLUE RIDGE CORAL
Despite its name, the color of this coral varies from violet through blue, turquoise, and green to yellow-brown. Its branching vertical plates can form massive colonies.
PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Tubbataha Reefs TYPE
Atolls
130 square miles (330 square km) AREA
Good; recovering from coral bleaching in 1998
CONDITION
LOCATION Central Sulu Sea, between the Philippines and northern Borneo
The Tubbataha Reefs lie around two atolls in the center of the Sulu Sea and are famous for the many large pelagic (open ocean) marine animals attracted to them—such as sharks, manta rays, turtles, and barracuda. The steeply shelving reefs here are also rich in smaller life, including many species of crustaceans, colorful nudibranchs (sea slugs), and more than 350 species of stony and soft coral. In the early 1990s, the Tubbataha Reefs were rated by scuba divers among the top ten dive sites in the world. However, during the 1980s they suffered considerable damage from destructive fishing practices and the establishment of a seaweed farm.
In 1988, the Philippines government intervened, declaring the area a National Marine Park, and since 1993 it has also been a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Today, the condition of the Tubbataha reefs has much improved, due to the enforcement of measures such as a prohibition on fishing and a ban on boats anchoring on the reefs (visiting craft must use mooring buoys). Live coral cover in most sites in 2004 showed significant increases after a coral bleaching episode in 1998.
CORAL DROPOFF
In this photograph of a steeply shelving reef slope, several species of soft coral are visible, together with a shoal of longfin bannerfish.
PACIFIC OCEAN WEST
Nusa Tenggara TYPE Fringing reefs, barrier reefs AREA 2,000 square miles (5,000 square km)
Damaged by fishing practices
CONDITION
Southern Indonesia, from Lombok in the west to Timor in the east
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LOCATION
REEF FLAT OFF PANTAR ISLAND
This shallow reef area, featuring numerous species of stony coral and a starfish, is in central Nusa Tenggara.
Nusa Tenggara is a chain of around 500 coral-fringed islands in southern Indonesia. The northern islands are volcanic in origin, while the southern islands consist mainly of uplifted coral limestone. Many of the reefs have been only rarely explored. However, what surveys have been carried out
indicate an extremely high diversity of marine life in this region. For example, a single large reef can contain more than 1,200 species of fish (more than in all the seas in Europe combined), and 500 different species of reefbuilding coral. Common animals here include eagle rays, manta rays,
humphead parrotfish, and various species of octopuses and nudibranchs (sea slugs). Major threats to the reefs in Nusa Tenggara include pollution from land-based sources, sediment pollution from logging, removal of fish from the reefs for the aquarium trade, and reef destruction by blast fishing.
161 PACIFIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Great Barrier Reef TYPE
Barrier reef
14,300 square miles (37,000 square km) AREA
Damaged by crown-of-thorns starfish; coral bleaching
CONDITION
Parallel to Queensland coast, northeastern Australia
LOCATION
Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, which stretches 1,250 miles (2,010 km), is the world’s largest coral reef system. Often described as the largest structure ever made by living organisms, it in fact consists of some 3,000 individual reefs and small coral islands. Its outer edge ranges from 18 to 155 miles (30 to 250 km) from the mainland, and its biological diversity is high. The reef contains about 350 species of stony coral and many of soft coral. Its 1,500 species of fish range from gobies, the smallest fish on the reef, and 45 species of butterflyfish, to several shark species, including silvertip, hammerhead, and whale sharks. The reef is also home to 500 species of algae, 20 species of sea
PACIFIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Marshall Islands TYPE
Atolls
2,400 square miles (6,200 square km) AREA
Generally good; some local degradation
CONDITION
Micronesia, southwest of Hawaii, western Pacific
LOCATION
REEF CHANNEL
In this view of a central area of the reef, a deep, meandering channel separates two reef platforms. The region’s high tidal range drives strong currents through such channels.
snakes, and 4,000 species of mollusks. Damage to the reef over the past 30 years has resulted mainly from predation by the crown-of-thorns starfish and a mass coral bleaching event in 1998. In 1975, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park was established, and in 1981 it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site. The Marshall Islands consist of 29 coral atolls and five small islands in the western Pacific. The atolls lie on top of ancient volcanic peaks that are thought to have erupted from the ocean floor 50–60 million years ago. They include Kwajalein, the largest atoll in the Pacific at 1,000 square miles (2,500 square km), and Bikini and Enewetak atolls, which were used by the US for testing nuclear weapons between 1946 and 1962. Human pressures on these two remote, evacuated atolls have been minimal during the past 50 years, and marine life around them now thrives; for example, 250 species of coral and up to 1,000 species of fish have been recorded at Bikini. MAJURO ATOLL
As with many Pacific atolls, the rim of Majuro Atoll consists partly of shallow submerged reef and partly of small, low-lying islands.
Hawaiian Archipelago TYPE Fringing reefs, atolls, submerged reefs AREA 450 square miles (1,180 square km)
Generally good; some degradation
CONDITION LOCATION
North-central Pacific
The Hawaiian Archipelago consists of the exposed peaks of a huge undersea mountain range. These mountains have formed over tens of millions of years as the Pacific Plate moves
northwest over a hotspot in Earth’s mantle. Coral reefs fringe some coastal areas of the younger, substantial islands at the southeastern end of the chain, such as Oahu and Molokai. To the northwest, located on the submerged summits of older, sunken islands, are several near-atolls (such as the French Frigate Shoals) and atolls (such as Midway Atoll). These reefs are highly isolated from all other coral reefs in the world, and although their overall biological diversity is relatively low, many new species have evolved on them. About a quarter of the animals and plants found in the Hawaiian Islands and a few nearby reefs are found nowhere else.
/NEOFTHETINIESTRESIDENTSOF THE'REAT"ARRIER2EEF ATLESS THAN1/3 INJUST¨MM LONG FROMSNOUTTOTAIL ISTHESTOUT INFANTFISH7HENDISCOVEREDIN THEINFANTFISHWASDECLAREDTO BETHEWORLDSSMALLESTVERTEBRATESPECIES 4HATTITLEHASSINCEBEENCLAIMEDFORA SLIGHTLYSHORTERSPECIESOF)NDONESIANCYPRINID (OWEVER THEINFANTFISHISMORESLENDERAND LIGHTERTHANTHECYPRINID
PACIFIC OCEAN SOUTHWEST
Society Islands TYPE Fringing reefs, barrier reefs, atolls
recorded. The reefs’ health is generally good, but some reefs around the busy vacation destination islands of Tahiti, Moorea, and Bora-Bora have been severely affected by construction, sewage, and sediment runoff.
AREA 600 square miles (1,500 square km)
Good, but significant local damage
CONDITION
LOCATION French Polynesia, northeast of New Zealand, south-central Pacific
The Society Islands comprise a chain of volcanic and coral islands in the South Pacific, including islands with barrier reefs (such as Rai’atea), islands with both fringing and barrier reefs (such as Tahiti), and atolls or nearatolls (such as Maupihaa and Maupiti). The reefs’ biological diversity is moderate compared with the reefs of Southeast Asia, although more than 160 coral species, 800 species of reef fish, 1,000 species of mollusks, and 30 species of echinoderm have been
FRENCH FRIGATE SHOALS
Reef fish, including longfin bannerfish, milletseed butterflyfish, and bluestripe snappers, swim around a table coral.
MOOREA
A wide fringing reef almost completely surrounds the shoreline of mountainous Moorea, part of which is visible in this view.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
PACIFIC OCEAN CENTRAL
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THE GREAT BARRIER REEF
The warm, clear waters of the reef support an astonishing variety of life. Here, fairy basslets can be seen shoaling over vividly colored soft corals. Bright coloration can serve several purposes for reef fish, including helping members of a species to recognize each other and acting as a warning to predators.
164
shallow seas
THE PELAGIC ZONE
LION’S-MANE JELLYFISH
This daunting giant of the plankton can grow up to 6 ft (2 m) across, with 200-ft (60-m) tentacles.
THE PELAGIC ZONE IS THE WATER COLUMN ABOVE the continental shelf (although the term is also used to refer to the water column of the open ocean). It is a vast environment, and temperature and salinity variations within it result in distinct water masses. These are separated by “fronts” and characterized locally by different plankton. Coastal and shelf waters are more productive than the open ocean. When calm, the water stratifies, cutting off the surface plankton from essential nutrients in the layers below. Storms cause the layers to mix, stimulating phytoplankton blooms. High latitudes have seasonal plankton cycles; in warmer waters, seasonal upwelling of nutrient-rich deeper water triggers phytoplankton growth.
MICROSCOPIC PRODUCTIVITY Much of the primary productivity in the world’s oceans and seas occurs over the continental shelves. Tiny phytoplankton floating in the surface waters harness the Sun’s energy through photosynthesis to produce living cells. Some of the tiniest algae (picoplankton) are thought to supply a considerable amount of primary production. As well as sunlight, nutrients and trace metals are needed for phytoplankton growth. These are PRIMARY PRODUCTION often in short supply in the open This satellite map shows variations in ocean, but shelf waters benefit from a primary production, indicated by the continual input from rivers, mixing by concentration of the pigment waves and, on some coasts, the chlorophyll a in the oceans and the amount of vegetation on land. upswelling of nutrient-rich water.
DRIFTING ZOOPLANKTON
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Continental shelf zooplankton contains many larvae of sea bed animals that then drift away to new areas.
CHLOROPHYLL A CONCENTRATION LOW
HIGH
VEGETATION INDEX MIN
MAX
THE PLANKTON CYCLE
RIDING THE CURRENTS
In temperate and polar seas, optimal phytoplankton growth occurs in both spring and summer. There are long daylight hours and maximum nutrient levels after winter storms have mixed the water column and resuspended dissolved nutrients from the seabed. The well-known spring blooms can rapidly turn clear seawater into pea soup, or a variety of other colors, depending on the organism. Typically, there is a succession of phytoplankton species with short blooms. Responding to abundant food and increasing temperatures, tiny zooplankton begin grazing the phytoplankton and reproducing. Bottom-living coastal animals release clouds of larvae to feed in the nutritious broth, before taking up life on the sea bed. Spawning fish also contribute a mass of eggs and larvae. Eventually, the phytoplankton is grazed down, nutrients are exhausted, and productivity drops off, in an annual cycle that will be renewed again next spring.
From tiny algae to giant jellyfish, the animals and plants of the plankton either float passively or swim weakly. This is mainly to keep them up in the sunlit surface waters, where most production occurs; these drifters must go wherever the currents take them. On most continental shelves, there is a residual drift in a particular direction, although wind-driven surface currents, where most of the plankton live, can move in any direction for short periods. Some animals go on long migrations to spawn, relying on residual currents to bring their larvae back to areas suitable for their growth into adults; for example, conger eel larvae take around two years to drift back from their spawning grounds far off the continental shelf. The larvae of the majority of coastal animals, including those of barnacles, mussels, hydroids, and echinoderms, spend much shorter periods in the plankton—just long enough to disperse to new areas of coast. However, the plankton is a dangerous place, full of hungry mouths and tentacles, and though millions of eggs and larvae are released, the vast majority of planktonic feeders will die; only a lucky few find a suitable place to settle and grow.
HUMAN IMPACT
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COLONIZED ROPE
This rope was colonized over the course of a year by sea squirts, feather stars, fan worms, and anemones, their planktonic larvae having been transported by ocean currents.
165
MIGRATORY SHOALS
Pelagic fish such as these mackerel move around the ocean in response to temperature changes. They are among the pelagic zone’s larger predators.
PELAGIC FISHERIES
The animals of the plankton, especially small crustaceans such as copepods and krill, are eaten by fish, mainly small, shoaling species such as herring, sand eels, sardines, and anchovies. Most of these fish live permanently in midwater, using the seabed only to spawn or to avoid predators. They are strong swimmers (nekton), using speed to catch prey and evade predators. They can travel long distances against residual currents to feed and also to reach their spawning grounds. Small, shoaling fish are, in turn, food for larger predators, such as squid, tuna, cetaceans, NEKTONIC INVERTEBRATE and sharks. Whale sharks, basking Squid are the only invertebrates sharks, and baleen whales are among that swim strongly enough to be the largest of the marine animals, yet classed as nekton. They catch a variety of prey including fish and they feed directly on plankton, planktonic crustaceans. consuming vast quantities.
Continental shelf waters support massive quantities of pelagic fish, ultimately sustained by abundant plankton. The most important fisheries are for herring, sardines, anchovies, pilchards, mackerel, capelin and jackfish. Squid are also fished commercially. Many fish stocks are under severe pressure as boats and nets get bigger and the technology to pinpoint shoals becomes ever more sophisticated. Pelagic fish and squid are caught in drift nets that hang about 30 ft (10 m) down from the surface. In the north Pacific, some 105,000 miles (170,000 km) of drift net is available to major fisheries; unfortunately, these nets also trap cetaceans, turtles, and diving birds. Drifting longlines are used for tuna and swordfish; these also catch juvenile fish, sharks, turtles, and seabirds. Midwater trawls capture vast quantities of shoaling fish such as herring, mackerel, and sardines. Small-scale fisheries for a wide variety of other pelagic species are important in sustaining local coastal communities worldwide.
FOOD CHAIN THREAT
Sand eels are food for seabirds (such as this Arctic tern), seals, cetaceans, and larger fish. Despite their importance at the base of many food chains, vast quantities are taken by fisheries for feeding to livestock and farmed fish, and are burned as fuel oil.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
ACTIVE SWIMMERS
THE STEEL-BLUE WAVES of the open ocean
conceal an extraordinary landscape, where the continents plunge down to a vast, undulating, muddy plain. Here, the ocean water column supports layer upon layer of life, from the surface zone, powered by sunlight, to the crushing pressure of the darkest depths. In places, the abyssal plain is broken by underwater volcanoes or by mountain ranges high enough to rival the Himalayas. Springs of super-hot water emerge from these mountainsides, supporting living communities unlike any others on the planet. Elsewhere, Earth’s vast tectonic plates collide, ripping trenches in the ocean floor and stimulating powerful earthquakes. Yet fewer people have explored these mysterious depths than have flown in space.
TH E OPE N O CE AN A N D O C E A N F LOOR BENEATH THE WAVES
In the deepest ocean, an underwater Mount Everest could be hidden beneath these waves— and still leave space for Mount Washington on top. As a result, we have better maps of the Moon than of the deep seabed.
168
the open ocean and ocean floor
OCEAN ZONES
SUNLIT ZONE 0–660 ft
ZONES OF THE OPEN OCEAN vary greatly with depth. Light and temperature changes occur quickly, while pressure increases incrementally. Although many of these changes are continuous, the ocean can be divided into a series of distinct depth zones, each of which produces very different conditions for living things. CONDITIONS IN THE OCEAN
THE SURFACE LAYER The top three feet of the ocean is the richest in nutrients. This upper layer is sometimes called the neuston, although this term is also used for the animals that live there, such as jellyfish. Amino acids, fatty acids, and proteins excreted by plants and animals float up into this surface layer, as do oils from the decomposing bodies of dead animals. These produce a rich supply of nutrients for phytoplankton. The top three feet of seawater is also the interface where gas exchange takes place between the ocean and the atmosphere. This is vitally important to all life on Earth, as half of the oxygen animals need for survival comes from the ocean. Not surprisingly, phytoplankton gathers in this surface zone in daylight, as do the animals that feed on them. This zone is also highly susceptible to chemical pollution and floating litter, which can be deadly for marine life. NOCTURNAL AND DIURNAL DISTRIBUTION
Only a small proportion of marine life inhabits the deep zone; the majority live above 3,300 ft (1,000 m). The sunlit zone is dangerous for animals—many stay in the twilight zone by day and only go upward at night. The sunlit zone is much emptier by day. NIGHT
DAY 10% sunlit zone
40% sunlit zone
75% twilight zone
50% twilight zone
15% deep zone
10% deep zone
Seawater rapidly absorbs sunlight, so only one percent of light reaches 660 ft (200 m) below the surface. Phytoplankton use the light to photosynthesize, forming the base of food chains. This zone drives all ocean life.
TWILIGHT ZONE 660–3,300 ft Too dark for photosynthesis, but with just enough light to hunt by, many animals move from this zone into the sunlit zone at night.
DARK ZONE 3,300 ft–13,100 ft Almost no light penetrates below 3,300 ft (1,000 m). From here to the greatest depths, it is dark, so no plants can grow, and virtually the only source of food is the “snow” of waste from above. Temperatures down here are a universally chilly 35–39oF (2–4oC), and the pressures so extreme that only highly adapted animals can survive. The dark zone is defined as continuing down to the abyssal plain, below 13,100 ft (4,000 m). Technically, all the water below 3,300 ft (1,000 m) is a dark zone, where the only light comes from bioluminescent animals (see p.224). However, for convenience, the waters below the dark zone can be further subdivided.
ABYSSAL ZONE 13,100–19,700 ft Beyond the continental slope, the sea bed flattens out. In many areas, it forms vast plains at depths below 13,100 ft (4,000 m). Some areas drop deeper to a sea floor that undulates down to depths of 19,700 ft (6,000 m). Around 30 percent of the total seabed area lies between these depths. Animals living here move up and down through a narrow column above the sea bed, called the abyssal zone.
HADAL ZONE 19,700–36,100 ft The sea floor plunges below 19,700 ft (6,000 m) in only a few deep ocean trenches. This hadal zone makes up less than 2 percent of the total seafloor area. Only two human beings have ever visited this zone (see p.183), and the pressures are so high that only a few uncrewed submersibles are able to operate here. We therefore know very little about what lives in these great depths, although a fish has been dredged from a depth of 27,500 ft (8,370 m) and shrimplike amphipods have been photographed 35,797 ft (10,911 m) down. Some animals here may require the high pressure at these depths in order to survive.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
SCALE
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zones of the open ocean
DEEPEST OCEAN POINTS The column below shows the average depth (yellow band) and greatest depth (red band) of the oceans and some of the world’s seas.
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THE SUNLIT ZONE
North Sea average depth 308 ft (94 m) Baltic Sea greatest depth 1,473 ft (449 m) North Sea greatest depth 2,296 ft (700 m) Arctic Ocean average depth 3,248 ft (990 m) Mediterranean Sea average depth 4,921 ft (1,500 m) Caribbean Sea average depth 4,960 ft (1,512 m)
almost one-third of the total seabed area is made up of abyssal plains at around 14,800 ft (4,500 m).
Atlantic Ocean average depth 10,925 ft (3,330 m)
169
CRYSTAL WATERS
Crystal-clear tropical waters look idyllic, but the clarity indicates that there are few nutrients and therefore few phytoplankton in the water. As a result, feeding for animals is quite poor.
The sunlit zone is the range in which there is enough sunlight for photosynthesis. The ocean absorbs different wavelengths of sunlight to differing extents (see p.38). Nearly all red light is absorbed within 30 ft (10 m), so red animals look black below this depth. Green light penetrates much deeper in clear water, down to around 330 ft (100 m), and blue light to twice that. Due to the presence of chlorophyll, phytoplankton preferentially absorb the red and blue portions of the light spectrum (for photosynthesis) and reflect green light. They can photosynthesize down to about 660 ft (200 m) in clear water. In cloudy water, the sunlit zone is shallower, because light is absorbed more quickly. The accumulations of phyto- and zooplankton in fertile waters absorb sunlight, reducing the depth of the sunlight zone. Phytoplankton must stay in the sunlit layer during daylight to photosynthesize. Zooplankton follows them there to feed, along with animals that feed on zooplankton. This zone is dangerous because light makes animals conspicuous to their hunters.
Indian Ocean average depth 12,762 ft (3,890 m) Pacific Ocean average depth 14,041 ft (4,280 m)
Southern Ocean average depth 14,763 ft (4,500 m)
Mediterranean Sea greatest depth 16,715 ft (5,095 m) (Hellenic Trough)
Arctic Ocean greatest depth 18,377 ft (5,601 m) (Molloy Deep)
Southern Ocean greatest depth 23,466 ft (7,152 m)
FEEDING IN THE SUNLIT ZONE
The phytoplankton of the sunlit zone is the food of zooplankton. Larger animals, such as these shrimp, in turn feed on zooplankton. Phytoplankton is at the bottom of most ocean food chains.
Caribbean Sea greatest depth 25,213 ft (7,685 m) (Caymen Trench)
Indian Ocean greatest depth 25,344 ft (7,725 m) (Java Trench)
Atlantic Ocean greatest depth 29,404 ft (8,962 m) (Puerto Rico Trench)
Pacific Ocean greatest depth 35,829 ft (10,920 m) (Mariana Trench)
ZONES OF LIFE
The different zones of life in the deep ocean are shown here, together with the depths reached by humans and a selection of marine animals. Most life is concentrated above 3,300 ft (1,000 m), where there is some light.
Phytoplankton must remain in the sunlit zone if it is to catch enough sunlight for photosynthesis. This zone is the warmest and richest in the nutrients needed for growth. It would be counterproductive to expend huge amounts of energy to stay in this zone, so phytoplankton has developed a wide range of mechanisms to help it hang there effortlessly. Buoyancy bubbles, droplets of oil, or stores of light fats keep some species afloat. Others are covered in spines, which increase their surface area and help buoy them up. Some phytoplankton forms colonial chains, which produce more drag in water and slow the rate at which the phytoplankton sink. One group, called dinoflagellates, have threadlike flagellae that let them swim weakly. In this highly productive zone, phytoplankton produces half of the oxygen in the atmosphere. In temperate regions, phytoplankton proliferates in summer, sometimes forming dense blooms.
DIATOM
Diatoms are a very prolific type of phytoplankton. Some grow colonially, attached to rocks in chains or mats. Each year, six billion tons of phytoplankton grow in the oceans worldwide.
ZOOPLANKTON
This sample of zooplankton, collected in a net, includes an echinoderm (bottom left), a radiolarian, and a crab larva (center), with a fish egg (bottom right).
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Beyond the abyssal plains, undulating, rocky seabed stretches down to around 19,700 ft (6,000 m). Only the ocean trenches reach deeper.
LIVING IN THE SUNLIT ZONE
170
the open ocean and ocean floor
PLANKTON AND NEKTON In spring, as phytoplankton blooms begin to develop, zooplankton start multiplying. They follow the phytoplankton into the sunlit zone to feed. Most are herbivores that feed on phytoplankton; some are carnivores that hunt other zooplankton. Many are classed as meroplankton—the young of animals like crabs, lobsters, barnacles, and some fish—which have a planktonic larval stage and use the currents to spread. By taking advantage of the summer phytoplankton feast, they avoid competing for food with adults of their own kind. While plankton drift with the currents, many free-swimming animals (collectively called nekton) gather to feed on them: fish, squid, marine mammals, and turtles. These, in turn, are food for predatory fish and seabirds. Some larger animals, such as basking sharks, also feed on zooplankton and nekton. SARGASSUMFISH
Here, two Sargassumfish are hiding in Sargussum seaweed, floating on the surface of the Sargasso Sea.
GIANT FILTER-FEEDER
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
More than 36 ft (11 m) long, basking sharks like this one scoop up shoals of plankton, then filter them from the water with the white gill rakers inside their jaws.
THE TWILIGHT ZONE In the twilight zone, there is just enough light for animals to see—and be seen. As a result, predators and prey are in constant battle. Many species are almost totally translucent, to avoid casting even a faint shadow. Others are reflective, to disguise themselves against the light from above, or have wafer-thin bodies that reduce their COPEPOD silhouette. To cope with dim light, many Copepods are herbivores. They animals in this zone have large eyes. make up 70 percent of the total The main source of food here is detritus. zooplankton population, with Many animals therefore migrate upward into thousands in a cubic yard. the sunlit zone, where food is plentiful, at night, returning to the twilight zone as the Sun rises. Millions of tonnes of animals, equivalent to around 30 per cent of the total marine biomass, make this daily trek—by far the largest migration of life on Earth. The length of the journey is a matter of scale. Small planktonic animals measuring less than 1mm (1/25in) in length may only migrate through 20m (70ft), but some larger shrimp travel 600m (2,000ft) each way, every day.
zones of the open ocean
THE DARK AND ABYSSAL ZONES
SQUID OF THE OPEN OCEAN
The waters below the twilight zone are all dark, cold, subject to high pressure, and impoverished in food. For animals adapted to these deep zones, pressure is not a problem: their liquid-filled bodies are almost incompressible, compared to the gasfilled bodies of surface-living birds and mammals, which are much more easily compressible and subject to the effects of pressure. Most fish use gases in their swim bladders to maintain buoyancy, and these are susceptible to pressure change. Many deepwater fish therefore have no functional swim bladders. For most deep-water species, lack of food is the biggest problem: only about five percent of the energy that plants produce at the surface filters down to these depths. Animals of the deep are typically slow-moving, slow-growing, and longlived. They conserve energy by waiting for food to come to them. Many therefore have massive mouths and powerful teeth. Others use tricks to catch prey: anglerfish dangle lures, and some species even harbor luminescent bacteria or use chemical processes to make these lures and other structures glow. DISCOVERY
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171
Squid live in several zones of the ocean, from the sunlit zone, where this big-fin reef squid is found, to the deep zone. Deep-sea squid are difficult to photograph and are often photographed only as dead specimens.
SPOOKFISH
mucus on body attract bacteria, which protect it from heat
The brownsnout spookfish is found at depths of up to 3,300 ft (1,000 m), on the boundary of the dark zone. Its bones are so thin that it is almost transparent, and its large eyes look upward to spot predators attacking from above. It feeds mainly on copepods, and gives birth to live young that float in the plankton.
red tentacles around head gather food and provide sensory information
HEAT-TOLERANT WORM
This polychaete worm (a type of segmented worm) was discovered by the Alvin submersible in 1979— and named Alvinella pompejana in its honor. It is the most heat-tolerant animal on Earth, living near water emerging from hydrothermal vents at 570˚F (300˚C).
THE HADAL ZONE
A polystyrene cup attached to the outside of a submersible resurfaces at a fraction of its original size, illustrating the effects of pressure in the deep ocean.
ALVIN SUBMERSIBLE
Alvin is designed to withstand the extreme pressure of the deep zone and has enabled scientists to make many important discoveries during over 4,000 dives.
FANGTOOTH FISH
The fangtooth has been recorded at depths of 16,380 ft (4,992 m). Like many deep-water fish, it has a large head and massive teeth. Sensory organs along its body detect prey movement in the dark.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
DEEP SQUEEZE
Few deep-water species have been observed in their natural environment of the hadal zone and even fewer photographed. Many species are known only from samples dredged up in nets, and most photographs are of dead specimens (including the fangtooth on the right). Sometimes deep-sea animals can be studied in aquariums, but many species cannot survive temperature and pressure changes when brought to the surface. Although many of the animals here hunt each other, the food chain must begin with a supply of food from above. Whereas animals on the seabed can patrol large areas to find food particles accumulated there over weeks and months, animals in midwater must grab food particles in the short time when they float downward past them, which is much trickier. Only a small proportion of the detritus from above is harvested in midwater, so food is always scarce. Scientists observing this zone often see the same species repeatedly. The environment of this zone is remarkably uniform worldwide and there are few physical or ecological barriers to block the movement of species. Many deep-water species therefore are widely distributed, and several are found in every ocean. As a result, species diversity is low: only around 1,000 of the known 29,000 fish species live at this depth.
OCEAN EXPLORER
The Ocean Explorer is an ROV that can dive to 9,400 ft (2,865 m). Controlled by the support ship through a cable, it can take photographs of the sea floor.
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exploration with submersibles By the mid-20th century, most of Earth’s land surface
VIEWING MID-OCEAN
TYPES OF SUBMERSIBLE JOHNSON SEA-LINK The acrylic sphere of the Johnson Sea-Link observation dome gives scientists a wide view of the animals that live in midwater. This highly maneuverable submersible has a depth limit of about 3,300 ft (1,000 m). It is 23 ft (7 m) long and can take a crew of four.
BLACK SMOKER In April 1979, a team onboard Alvin was diving on the East Pacific Rise when they saw an astonishing sight: a tall spire of rock spewing out black fluid like billowing smoke. They had discovered the first black smoker.
EXPLORING THE SEA FLOOR
had been explored, but it wasn’t until the 1960s, when a variety of submersibles were developed, that the amazing sights in the deep oceans began to be revealed. Submersibles are small under- water vehicles that can be crewed or uncrewed. They are designed to perform a variety of often highly specialized tasks. The most famous crewed submersible is Alvin, operated by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (see p.182-83). Built in 1962, Alvin made its first dive in 1964. By the end of 2005, it had completed 4,162 dives and spent the equivalent of 1,200 days underwater. A typical dive lasts about seven hours at an average depth of 6,560 ft (2,000 m). In 1966, it helped locate an H-bomb lost in the Mediterranean Sea off Spain. In 1977, the crew discovered the first hydrothermal vents. Alvin is still limited to a maximum depth of 14,800 ft (4,500 m). A new generation of submersibles is being launched (see panel, right), including a replacement for Alvin, scheduled for launch in 2009. Newer designs may no longer depend on ballast and buoyancy tanks to control their descent into the depths, but may instead use technologies that have been developed for flight.
RECOVERING SAMPLES Alvin is equipped with mechanical arms that allow samples to be collected from the sea bed. Scientists aboard the support ship are ready to analyze material collected from the depths.
INTO THE DEEP The only way for humans to explore deep water is in a pressurized diving bell or submersible, or by using an uncrewed remotely operated vehicle (ROV) to bring back photographs. Kaiko, a Japanese ROV, has reached depths of 36,100 ft (11,000 m) (see p.183). In 2006, trials of a hybrid (H)ROV that is designed to operate on the very deepest parts of the sea floor will begin. It will be either free-swimming or tethered and will be able to drill cores, take sonar surveys, and record images. scuba diver nuclear submarine Deep Flight Aviator
Sea Level 3,300 ft (1,000 m)
Deep Flight I
6,500 ft (2,000 m) 9,800 ft (3,000 m)
Alvin
13,100 ft (4,000 m)
SHINKAI 6500 Launched in 1989 by the Japan Marine Science and Technology Center, Shinkai 6500 has dived to 21,414 ft (6,527 m), a record for an untethered crewed submersible. In 2006 the China Ocean Minerals and R & D Association (COMRA) will test a crewed craft that will reach 23,000 ft (7,000 m).
16,400 ft (5,000 m) 19,700 ft (6,000 m)
COMRA
23,000 ft (7,000 m) 26,300 ft (8,000 m) 29,500 ft (9,000 m)
Deep Flight II
HROV
32,800 ft (10,000 m) 36,100 ft (11,000 m)
FLYING UNDERWATER
Shinkai
DEEP FLIGHT I The American engineer Graham Hawkes thinks future submersibles will “fly” underwater, like his Deep Flight Aviator and his latest prototype Deep Flight I.
THE NEXT GENERATION Hawkes believes that future submersibles, such as the proposed Deep Flight II, will use short, inverted wings to provide “negative lift” and pull the craft down quickly.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
gulper eel
DEEP DIVER
white shark
seamounts and guyots MOUNTAINS IN THE SEA 8,850 ft (2,700 m) 9,000 ft (2,750 m) 9,200 ft (2,800 m) 9,350 ft (2,850 m)
chain of large seamounts
This false-color map shows how a chain of seamounts has arisen, close to where two spreading tectonic plates have been displaced sideways by a transform fault. Other seamounts occur singly away from the ridge.
175
N
isolated seamount
transform fault isolated guyot
crest of East Pacific Rise
9,500 ft (2,900 m) 9,700 ft (2,950 m) 9,850 ft (3,000 m) 10,000 ft (3,050 m) 10,200 ft (3,100 m) 10,300 ft (3,150 m) 10,500 ft (3,200 m) 10,700 ft (3,250 m) 10,800 ft (3,300 m) 11,000 ft (3,350 m) 11,150 ft (3,400 m) 11,300 ft (3,450 m) 11,500 ft (3,500 m) 11,650 ft (3,550 m) 11,800 ft (3,600 m) 12,000 ft (3,650 m) 12,150 ft (3,700 m)
East Pacific Rise
12,300 ft (3,750 m)
fracture zone
12,500 ft (3,800 m) HUMAN IMPACT
2/5'(9 42/5",%
DEPTH
LIFE ON A SEAMOUNT
PRIMNOID CORAL THREAT
Scientists fear some primnoid
FEEDING FROM THE CURRENTS
This squat lobster, or pinch bug, is a scavenger living on rock faces. Currents welling over the Bowie Seamount in the northeast Pacific supply rich pickings.
soft corals. The feeding polyps, lined up along the branches, catch food from currents sweeping over the seamount.
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OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
coral species may be wiped out Some seamounts were first detected when by bottom-trawl fishing before fishermen discovered large shoals of fish in the area. they have even been named. The nutrient-rich waters trapped above seamounts support dense concentrations of phytoplankton as well as the zooplankton that feed on them. Freeswimming animals are attracted by this feast, including fish at densities found nowhere else in the open ocean. Predators such as sharks and seals also gather to feed. Seamount rock is colonized by suspension feeders—animals that catch plankton and detritus as it floats past. Only about one in a thousand seamounts has been explored underwater. However, in studies of 25 seamounts in the Tasman and Coral seas, 850 species (some previously thought extinct) were recorded. Seamounts are important biodiversity hotspots, with up to one-third SEAMOUNT FEEDER of species found there restricted to a Found in the tropics, this single seamount or group of seamounts. octocoral is a colony of
176
the open ocean and ocean floor
THE CONTINENTAL SLOPE AND RISE are areas of sloping sea floor that lead from the continental shelf to the abyssal plain. Beyond a point on the shelf called the shelf break, the sea bed begins to drop more steeply. This is the continental slope, which leads into the open ocean. It sweeps down to 9,800–14,800 ft (3,000–4,500 m), where the seabed flattens out. In places, the slope is broken by submarine canyons. Sediments wash down these canyons, and accumulate at the base of the slope in a gentler gradient, forming the continental rise.
CONTINENTAL MARGIN
THE CONTINENTAL SLOPE AND RISE
A typical continental margin is shown here, including the transition from a shoreline to the abyssal plain via the continental shelf, slope, and rise. The continental slope is about 87 miles (140 km) wide, and the continental rise is about 60 miles (100 km) wide. The vertical scale has been exaggerated: the continental slope actually has a gentle gradient, of about 1 in 50 (2 percent); and the rise is even gentler, at about 1 in 100 (1 percent).
submarine canyon shelf break— around 660 ft (200 m) below surface
slumped sediments form continental rise
CONTINENTAL SLOPE The rock of the continental slope is blanketed by sediments washed from the land that have accumulated over millions of years. Crustaceans, echinoderms, and many other animals live in, or on, these sediments. The slope is dissected by deep canyons. These have been cut by an abrasive mix of sediment and water, called turbidity currents, which flow down the gorges at 50–60 mph (80–100 km/h). Some submarine canyons are massive: the Grand Bahama Canyon in the Caribbean has cliffs rising 14,060 ft (4,285 m) from the canyon floor. Many canyons are seaward extensions of great rivers. At the canyon end, the sediment is deposited as a spreading outwash fan, extending far out onto the abyssal plain.
outwash fan at foot of canyon
large outwash fan extending onto abyssal plain
erosion gullies
CANYON AND GULLIES
This sonar image shows a deep submarine canyon in the continental slope off Sodwana Bay, in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa.
submarine canyon
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
LIFE ON THE CONTINENTAL SLOPE
CATCHING SABLEFISH
Sablefish are caught with longlines, 2/ 3 mile (1.2 km) long, that reach down toward the continental slope.
Like the shelf, the continental slope is enriched by nutrients washed off the land. This helps support both midwater (pelagic) and bottom-dwelling (demersal) fish. Fish stocks over most continental-shelf regions have declined dramatically in recent decades, as a result of overexploitation and poor management, driving more fishermen to seek deeper-water species over the continental slope. Unfortunately for fisheries, although deep-water species are SABLEFISH long-lived, they breed slowly, and stocks take a Sablefish breed slowly, it takes 14 years long time to recover. So and to replace each fish many fisheries are now caught. Fish farms (right) in serious decline. may be a better option.
ABYSSAL PLAIN This flat plain is formed by a deep accumulation of sediments. It typically lies at a depth of 15,000 ft (4,500 m).
the continental slope and rise
past shoreline formed by higher sea level in past
submarine canyon extends from shelf to abyssal plain
177
some sediments deposited as delta at river mouth
sediments carried down river to sea
present shoreline
material from uplands is gradually eroded and washed into rivers
GANGES DELTA
The Ganges River carries 2 billion tons of sediment a year. Some is deposited in this massive delta. More is carried out to sea where it forms a deep-sea fan over the Bay of Bengal. TUBE ANEMONES
These sea anemones bury their bodies in sediment, at depths of 13,100 ft (4,000 m), feeding with their tentacles.
DISCOVERY SHORELINE Shorelines are shaped by erosion and deposition and move with changing sea levels.
CONTINENTAL RISE Deeper sediments build up, creating a gentle gradient of less than 1 in 100.
CONTINENTAL SLOPE The slope drops to 9,800 ft (3,000 m) at a gradient of 1 in 50.
COASTAL PLAIN An area of low-lying, flat land between the uplands and the sea.
CONTINENTAL SHELF The continental shelf is typically 460–660 ft (140–200 m) below the surface. Its width varies greatly.
CONTINENTAL RISE
SEDIMENT FEEDER
Brittlestars are among the most common animals found feeding on the sediment of the continental rise. central disk
mouth (on underside of disk) five arms, arranged radially
LIZARDFISH HABITAT
The highfin lizardfish is found on the abyssal plain and continental rise, typically below about 6,600 ft (2,000 m), in water colder than 39ºF (4ºC).
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OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
The continental rise is a thick wedge of sediment, up to 9 miles (15 km) deep, formed from material that has slumped downward to the base of the continental slope. This wedge drops gently away toward the abyssal plain. These sediment mounds are particularly extensive where several deep-sea fans meet and coalesce at the foot of submarine canyons. The geological boundary between the continental and oceanic crusts is completely obscured beneath these sediments. The sediments of the continental rise merge into the abyssal plains beyond. Brittlestars and polychaete worms, a type of segmented worm, live on the sediments, surviving on detritus falling from above. Atlantic Red Crabs scavenge on the seabed, migrating up the continental slope to breed. Deep-sea cod, Dover sole, rockfish, goosefish, and thornyheads are among the demersal species living on the slope and rise.Trawling has damaged many of these habitats, but the deeper canyons remain havens of biodiversity.
MOUNTAINS These rocks formed on an ancient sea bed and were later uplifted. Erosion will eventually return them to the sea.
COLD-WATER COMMUNITY
A squat lobster shelters among the polyps of the cold-water stony coral Lophelia pertusa, or tuft coral, in a Norwegian fjord.
180
the open ocean and ocean floor
OCEAN FLOOR SEDIMENTS OVER VAST AREAS OF THE SEABED, THE UNDERLYING landforms are hidden beneath deep layers of sediments. Made up of silts, muds, or sands that have built up over 200 million years, they now form a blanket that is several miles thick in places. The sediments have various origins. One group, terrigenous sediments, come from land, mainly from fragments of eroded rock that are carried down rivers into the sea, then down the continental slope to form the continental rise and abyssal plain beyond. Other sediments are biogenic, formed from the hard remains of dead animals and plants. A few, called authigenic sediments, are made up of chemicals precipitated from seawater. There are even cosmogenic sediments, which come from outer space as particles in space dust and meteors. All accumulate to form extensive, flat plains. Various animals feed here and burrow into the sediments for shelter.
DEEPSEA SEDIMENTS
SEDIMENT THICKNESS 0
1,650 ft
3,300 ft
3 miles
(500 m)
(1,000 m)
(5 km)
MAPPING SEDIMENTS
Ocean sediment depths can be measured and mapped using echosounding. Some areas (white on the map above) are still unsurveyed. Sediment is thickest near land. Glaciers also carry many sediments into the oceans.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
04%2/0/$//:% 0TEROPODSARESMALLWINGEDSNAILS THATFLOATINMIDWATER7HEN THEYDIE THEIRINTERNALSHELLSOF ARAGONITECALCIUMCARBONATE SINKTOTHESEABED CONTRIBUTING TOBIOGENICOOZES4HEPRESENCE OFPTEROPODREMAINSINSAMPLES COLLECTEDFROMDEEPINTHEOOZE REVEALCHANGESOVERMILLENNIAIN WATERTEMPERATURESANDSEALEVELS
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(20 km)
The average thickness of sediments on the ocean floor is 1,500 ft (450 m), but in the Atlantic Ocean and around Antarctica, sediments can be up to 3,300 ft (1,000 m) deep. Closer to the continents—along the continental rise—sediments washed from the land accumulate more rapidly, and can be up to 9 miles (15 km) deep. In the open ocean, farther from the source of terrigenous sediments, the buildup rate is very slow: from a fraction of an inch to a few inches in a thousand years. That is slower than the rate at which dust builds up on furniture in an average house. The accumulated sediments tell scientists a great deal about the last 200 million years of Earth’s history. Their form and arrangement provide a vivid snapshot of sea-floor spreading, the evolving varieties of ocean life, alterations in Earth’s magnetic field, and changes in ocean currents and climate. WHITE CLIFFS OF DOVER
These chalk cliffs originated on the sea bed from a biogenic ooze, formed from algal scales (coccoliths) that built up to form layers hundreds of yards thick. They are now raised above sea level.
SEDIMENTS DERIVED FROM THE LAND Most terrigenous sediments come from the weathering of rock on land and are swept into the oceans, mainly by rivers but also by glaciers, ice sheets, and wind. Coastal erosion adds to these sediments. Often, they are washed down through submarine canyons to the deeper ocean. Sometimes, the route from land to sea is more indirect: volcanic eruptions eject material into the upper atmosphere before it falls as “rain” into the ocean. In the deepest ocean floors, below about 13,000 ft (4,000 m), the main sediment is red clay, composed mostly of fine-grained silts that have washed off the continents and accumulated incredibly slowly— about 1/32 in or 1 mm per thousand years. These clays may include up to 30 percent fine, biogenic particles and have four main mineral components—chlorite, illite, kaolinite, and montmorillonite. Clay types depend on origin and climate. DUST STORM RESULTS IN SILT For example, chlorite dominates in Winds from arid regions, such as polar regions, kaolinite in the tropics, North Africa (shown in this satellite and montmorillonite is produced by image) carry dust far out to sea, where it sinks to form silts. volcanic activity.
181
OOZE-FORMING ZOOPLANKTON
These radiolarians are single-celled planktonic animals. After death, their skeletons, made of silica glass, sink to the sea bed, accumulating as sediments.
FEEDING ON THE OOZE BIOGENIC OOZES
COCCOLITHOPHORE
When this coccolithophore dies, its platelets will add to the calcareous ooze.
SEA CUCUMBER FEEDING
Sea cucumbers wander widely over the sea bed, sucking up the sediment and then extracting its organic content.
FORAMINIFERA
The tiny shells of dead foraminiferans add to the biogenic oozes.
tube feet enable animal to traverse sediment while foraging
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Biogenic sediments are formed mainly from the shells and skeletons of microscopic organisms that sink to the seabed after death. The decaying remains of larger organisms, such as mollusks, corals, calcareous algae, and starfish, add to this accumulation. Oozes are calcareous if derived from the calcium carbonate shells of foraminifera, pteropods, and coccolithophores (microscopic algae), or siliceous if derived from the silica shells of single-celled radiolarians or diatoms. Because silica dissolves rapidly in seawater, siliceous oozes only build up beneath zones of high primary production. As calcareous shells and skeletons sink, they reach a depth (around 15,000 ft/4,500 m) where the water becomes more acidic; this, combined with pressure, means calcareous remains are dissolved rapidly in the deep sea. Calcareous oozes therefore occur only above this “calcium carbonate compensation depth,” beneath which the sea bed consists mainly of terrigenous red clays.
The “snow” of calcareous and siliceous remains from the upper levels accumulates on the ocean floor, providing the main source of food for animals living in or on the sediments. Bacteria live in the ooze, where they break down organic remains. In turn, they— along with other organic matter—are consumed by multitudes of tiny foraminiferans. Nematodes, roundworms, isopods, and small bivalve mollusks live and feed in the mud. Brittlestars feed on the ooze by sweeping food off its surface with their arms. Sea pens, crinoids, and glass sponges, which are anchored to the sea bed, filter organic particles from the water column.
182
the open ocean and ocean floor
ABYSSAL PLAINS, TRENCHES, AND MIDOCEAN RIDGES OVER VAST AREAS, THE SEABED IS COVERED BY A flat expanse of accumulated sediments. Life here is sparse, relying entirely on food falling from above. In places, the abyssal plains are disrupted by more dramatic features, created by the movement of tectonic plates. Where plates diverge, magma wells up through the gap to create mid-ocean ridges. New sea bed is constantly being formed at these ridges. At the other extreme, where plates collide, one plate is dragged downward, opening up a trench. These trenches are the deepest places on Earth.
ABYSSAL PLAINS
ABYSSAL FLOOR
A recent study off the east coast of North America revealed 798 species buried in a small sediment sample from the sea bed. MANGANESE NODULE
In places, the abyssal plain is littered with potato-sized nodules of manganese, often contaminated with other valuable metals such as nickel, copper, and cobalt.
Over large areas of the ocean floor, sediments have built up a blanket several miles thick, obscuring the underlying topography. This produces vast flat or gently undulating abyssal plains at a typical depth of 14,800 ft (4,500 m). These are most common in the Atlantic, where the Sohm Plain alone covers 350,000 square miles (900,000 square km). Abyssal plains lie at different depths, with barriers between them, and this leads to submarine waterfalls, where water spills over the barrier and down into the plain below, at rates of up to 5 mph (8 km/h). Occasional abyssal storms also occur, stimulated, in a way not yet fully understood, by instabilities at the ocean surface resulting from atmospheric conditions. The abyssal plains were originally thought to be a world without seasons, but recent studies have shown that life here responds to pulses of food from above—for instance, when the summer bloom of plankton dies and sinks. Most animals in this zone are scavengers with a body temperature close to that of the surrounding water. They move and grow slowly, reproduce infrequently, and live longer than their relatives at the surface.
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OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
mouth barbel
body
SEABED SCAVENGERS
Hagfish feed on animal corpses that fall to the abyssal plain. Blind and jawless, these primitive fish are attracted by smell. They bore into corpses, using their horny teeth, and secrete clouds of mucus to deter other scavengers.
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abyssal plains, trenches, and mid-ocean ridges
OCEAN TRENCHES Ocean trenches are created by a process called subduction. Where oceanic and continental tectonic plates collide, the denser but thinner oceanic plate is forced down beneath the thicker but less dense continental plate, and plunges to its destruction in the mantle deep below. Where two oceanic plates collide, the older plate is subducted beneath the younger. The buckling where the plates collide causes a deep depression at the point of impact—an ocean trench. These are the deepest places on the ocean floor. Trenches are typically V-shaped, with steeper slopes on the continental side. The Pacific is the region of most active subduction, with 17 of the 20 major ocean trench systems. The Atlantic has two major trenches, the Puerto Rico and South Sandwich trenches, and the Java Trench is the only major trench in the Indian Ocean. The deepest trench on Earth is the Mariana Trench, located in the Pacific Ocean, near the Mariana Islands.
MARIANA TRENCH
The Mariana Trench is roughly 1,600 miles (2,500 m) long and 40 miles (70 km) wide. This section of the trench is just off the coast of Japan, which appears as a dark green mass here.
Japan
China
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Mariana Trench
seamounts Pacific Ocean
EXPLORING THE ABYSSAL PLAIN
Alvin has downward-facing portholes to study the abyssal plain. Its scientists deploy baited traps to attract deep-water life, such as six-gilled sharks.
DISCOVERY
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LIFE IN THE OCEAN TRENCHES
A small number of these curious fish have been collected from the sea bed in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans, at depths of at least 10,000 ft (3,000 m). Like many deep-water fish, they are almost transparent, with tiny eyes.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
GELATINOUS BLINDFISH
Animals have been found at great depths in the ocean trenches. The depth record belongs to a cuskeel, appropriately named Abyssobrotula galatheae, which was dredged from 27,500 ft (8,400 m) in the Puerto Rico Trench by the Danish research ship Galathea. This fish has an elongated body up to 8 in (20 cm) long, a swollen snout, and small eyes. It can cope with pressure more than 800 times that at sea level. A segmented worm was found by Galathea in another deep trench, and sponges have been collected from 26,000 ft (8,000 m) in the Kuril– Kamchatka Trench. The uncrewed Japanese submersible Kaiko photographed a shrimplike amphipod called Hirondella gigas at 35,797 ft (10,911 m). In 1998, samples of this scavenging crustacean were collected in baited traps, and found to have a bacterium in their bodies that can survive only at above 525 times atmospheric pressure. Kaiko also collected sediment samples from the Challenger Deep, which contained 432 different species of foraminiferans, and a range of bacteria that can grow only at pressures above 600 atmospheres.
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184
the open ocean and ocean floor
THE RING OF FIRE
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All around the margins of the Pacific Ocean, tectonic plates are colliding. This produces a belt of intense volcanic and earthquake activity encircling the Pacific, known as the Ring of Fire. It extends for 18, 600 miles (30,000 km) in a series of arcs, from New Zealand, through Japan, and down the west coast of the Americas to Patagonia. About threequarters of the Pacific lies over a single oceanic plate, the Pacific Plate, which is colliding around its edges with the Eurasian, North American, Indian, and Australian plates, as well as their associated minor plates. As the oceanic Pacific Plate plunges beneath the lighter continental plates, massive slabs of rock shatter explosively along faults, producing frequent earthquakes, while chains of volcanoes erupt along the lines of weakness. Many of these volcanoes rise above sea level as islands, often arranged in characteristic arc-shaped chains that mirror the curved edge of the tectonic plate far below. Some of these islands are being eroded rapidly by the waves, and may one day become guyots (see p.174). Several deep ocean trenches are also aligned around this ring, where the sea bed is being dragged down by subduction, forcing deep gashes to open up in the sea floor. As they collide, the continental plates are compressed and thrust upward, producing mountain chains such as the Andes. ARCTIC OCEAN
A S
I
NORTH AMERICA
A
A T
L
AUSTRALASIA
HERN OCEAN SOUT
HOTSPOTS OF VOLCANIC ACTIVITY
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Red on this map shows areas of volcanic activity around the Pacific Ocean, highlighting the Ring of Fire. These volcanoes form on continental plates as oceanic plates are thrust below.
MOUNT ST. HELENS
Mount St. Helens in Washington is part of the Ring of Fire. It erupted in May 1980, blowing the whole top off the volcano. Here, in 2004, a new lava cone has begun to grow, producing steam.
N
OCEAN
OCEAN
SOUTH AMERICA
IC
O C E A N
INDIAN
A
T
P A C I F I C
-ID OCEAN RIDGEISLANDS OFFERPROTECTEDBREEDING PLACESFORMANYSEA BIRDS WITHRICHFEEDING PROVIDEDBYUPWELLING CURRENTSOFFSHORE4HE SOOTYTERNISFOUNDINALL TROPICALSEAS)TNESTS ONOCEANICISLANDS !SCENSION)SLAND ONCEPROVIDEDSAFENESTING FOR PAIRS UNTILHUMANS INTRODUCEDRATSANDCATS MORETHAN HALVINGTHESOOTYTERNPOPULATION
THE RIDGE ON LAND
For most of its vast length, the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is hidden deep beneath the ocean. However, at Iceland, where both the Eurasian and North American plates are separating, it rises above the surface.
abyssal plains, trenches, and mid-ocean ridges
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MIDOCEAN RIDGES New sea bed is produced wherever tectonic plates diverge. As plates move apart, they create a rift. Magma wells up through this rift from deep in the Earth’s mantle, forming volcanoes and creating an underwater mountain chain, called a mid-ocean ridge. The lava cools as it meets the seawater, and solidifies in vertical basalt dikes or fields of pillow lava (see p.44). Mid-ocean ridges are assembly lines along which new ocean floor is being produced. The ridges and lava fields remain visible for some time before sediments accumulate over them. Sometimes the volcanoes extend above sea level, producing islands such as Iceland. Some mid-ocean ridges spread slowly, allowing deep rift valleys to form down their centers— others are much faster-spreading but lack rift valleys. Sometimes the ridges are disrupted sideways by transform faults. As the new sea bed spreads outwards, tensions are created, making it crack. Water seeps into these cracks and re-emerges from hydrothermal vents (see p.188). The oceanic ridge system is the third largest feature on the Earth’s surface, after the oceans and continents.
PILLOW LAVA
Under the high pressure of the deep ocean, lava oozes slowly from the mid-ocean crests. When it meets cold seawater, it cools rapidly to form globular masses, called pillow lavas due to their shape. About 1.4 square miles (3.5 square km) of new sea floor is formed each year along mid-ocean ridges.
ASCENSION ISLAND
Ascension Island arises where the Mid-Atlantic Ridge protrudes above sea level in the south Atlantic. It covers 35 square miles (90 square km) and ascends to 2,817 ft (859 m) on Green Mountain. Sooty Terns and sea turtles breed around its shores.
RIDGES OF THE WORLD
OCEAN WANDERERS
Macquarie Island, on the Macquarie Ridge, provides a nesting site for the black-browed albatross. Outside of the breeding season, it wanders the Southern Ocean.
The longest mid-ocean ridge occurs where the Eurasian and African plates are diverging from the North and South American plates. The Mid-Atlantic Ridge runs along this boundary for 10,000 miles (16,000 km), from the Arctic Ocean to beyond the southern tip of Africa, equidistant between the continents on either side of the Atlantic and rising 6,000–13,000 ft (2,000–4,000 m) above the sea floor. A chain of volcanoes runs down its length, most famously in Iceland, where an eruption in 1963 created a new volcanic island, Surtsey. Ascension Island and the Azores lie on the ridge, while St. Helena and Tristan da Cunha arise from isolated volcanoes, displaced from it. A valley, 15 miles (25 km) wide, extends along the ridge crest. In the Pacific the main ridge system is the East Pacific Rise. This is Earth’s fastest-spreading system, separating at 5–6 in (13–16 cm) per year. A series of mid-ocean ridges encircle Antarctica, along the divergent boundaries between the Antarctic Plate and its neighbors, and the Carlsberg Ridge runs down the center of the Indian Ocean. Mid-Atlantic Ridge with eastern section displaced by fault in southern part of map
-42˚
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Atlantis transform fault 30˚
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THE MID-ATLANTIC RIDGE -44˚
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This section of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge has been displaced by the Atlantis Transform Fault. Transform faults occur where two plates slide sideways against each other.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
Atlantis fracture zone
SATELLITE OCEANOGRAPHY
Sensors mounted on satellites use various wavelengths to monitor Earth’s surface, atmosphere, and oceans, as illustrated in this computer-graphic montage of the Indian Ocean. Visible light, infrared radiation, and microwave data are all processed and projected onto maps that chart the ocean’s physical parameters. Satellites update the maps on a weekly, daily, or hourly basis to monitor ocean dynamics.
oceanography from space The world’s oceans are too vast to be adequately
FEATURES STUDIED FROM SPACE CLOUDS Cloud cover is detected using visible-light cameras, and cloud-top height data is derived from infrared radiometers on satellites such as Meteosat. These systems are used to track storms and forecast the weather.
RAINFALL The Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission uses a microwave radiometer to see through clouds and detect the presence of liquid water in the atmosphere. Rainfall measures are used in computer models of the climate and ocean.
WEATHER PLANT LIFE
studied using ships alone. Even if all of the depth soundings that were taken during the 20th century were to be plotted, the resultant map would provide only sparse information on the sea floor and would even be blank in large areas. The advent of satellite remote sensing in the 1960s brought a revolution in oceanography. For the first time, it was possible to take a picture showing an entire ocean basin. Hurricane tracking and warning was one of the first benefits to accrue from early weather satellites. Eventually, a large range of sensors were developed to probe the physical attributes of the ocean surface and the atmosphere above. Ocean color, temperature, and surface roughness are among the parameters that can be systematically monitored in some detail. Satellite-derived information is a vital component of practical applications such as weather forecasting, commercial fishing, oil prospecting, and ship routing. In some cases, 30 years of continuous observations have been built up, helping scientists to track seasonal and longterm changes in the ocean environment and understand its effects on the global climate.
CHLOROPHYLL Ocean color cameras use wavelengths of visible light to measure the concentration of chlorophyll, which is present in phytoplankton. This information is used for water-quality assessment, finding fish, and in various aspects of marine biology. MICROWAVE SCATTEROMETER Surface wind speed and direction are measured by satellites such as QuickScat, which bounces radio beams off the surface of the ocean. Wind-induced ocean waves modify the return signal, and the data can be used for meteorology and climate research.
WIND SPEED
MEASURING OCEAN DEPTH FROM SPACE Satellites cannot directly measure the depth of the seafloor, but it can be derived from the height of the sea surface. The sea is not flat. Water piles up above gravity anomalies caused by ocean-floor features such as seamounts, producing variations in the surface that are much larger than those produced by tides, winds, and currents. By comparing the height of the sea surface against a reference height, the depth of the sea floor can be estimated.
ocean floor
SURFACE TEMPERATURE Infrared radiometers can measure the temperature of the sea surface precisely. Shifts in ocean currents, cold-water upwelling, and ocean fronts can be monitored for ocean and climate research.
signal is bounced from satellite off ocean surface and timed water surface varies according to seabed profile
reference surface
dish to track satellite height and to receive data
TEMPERATURE
the longer the signal time, the lower the ocean surface
SYNTHETIC APERTURE RADAR Imaging radar systems, such as the one carried by Radarsat, penetrate clouds and can operate through the dark of the extended polar night to monitor ice shelves, sea ice, and icebergs year-round.
THERMAL GLIDER A new generation of instrument platforms is being developed to sample the vast subsurface volume of the world’s oceans. Autonomous Underwater Vehicles, or “sea gliders,” can undertake long cruises, surfacing every day to return their data via satellite communication links.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
the shorter the signal time, the higher the ocean surface
satellite
ICE COVER
ENVISAT Envisat carries a radar altimeter, which is similar to the instruments on aircraft that measure their height above the surface of Earth. satellite orbit
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the open ocean and ocean floor
VENTS AND SEEPS HYDROTHERMAL VENTS ARE SIMILAR to hot springs on land. Located near ocean ridges and rifts, at an average depth of 7,000 ft (2,100 m), they spew out mineral-rich, superheated seawater. Some have tall chimneys, formed from dissolved minerals that precipitate when the hot vent water meets cold, deepocean water. The mix of heat and chemicals supports animal communities around the vents—the first life known to exist entirely without the energy of sunlight. Elsewhere, slower, cooler emissions of chemicals called hydrocarbons occur from sites known as cold seeps.
DISCOVERY
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HYDROTHERMAL VENTS
DISTRIBUTION OF VENTS AND RIDGES
Since their discovery in 1977, hydrothermal vents have been found in the Pacific and Indian oceans, in the mid-Atlantic, and even in the Arctic, always near mid-ocean ridges and rifts.
Hydrothermal vents always form close to mid-ocean ridges and rifts (see p.185), where new ocean crust is forming and spreading, and where magma from Earth’s mantle lies relatively close to the surface. Seawater seeps into rock cracks opened up by the spreading sea floor. It penetrates several miles into the newly formed crust, close to the hot magma below. This heats the water to 660–750ºF (350– 400ºC). The high pressure at these depths stops it from boiling, and it becomes superheated, dissolving minerals from the rocks that it is passing through, including sulfur, which forms hydrogen sulfide. The hot water rises back up through cracks and erupts out of the vents as a hot, shimmering haze, complete with its load of minerals.
BLACK AND WHITE SMOKERS
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
As superheated water erupts from a hydrothermal vent, it meets the colder water of the ocean depths. This causes hydrogen sulfide in the vent water to react with the metals dissolved in it, including iron, copper, and zinc, which then come out of solution in the form of sulfide particles. Sometimes these form pools on the seabed. However, if the water is particularly hot, it spouts up a little before being chilled by the surrounding seawater, and the metal sulfides form a cloud of black, smokelike particles. Some of these minerals form a crust around the “smoke” plumes, building up into chimneys that can reach dozens of yards in height. Such vents are called black smokers. More recently, a different form of vent has been discovered. In these, the black sulfides come out of solution as solids well beneath the sea floor, but other minerals remain in the vent water. Silica and a white mineral called anhydrite form the “smoke” from these chimneys, which, because of their color, are called white smokers.
shaft water seeps into cracks and is superheated below seabed
THE FORMATION OF A SMOKER
Water, heated by magma deep beneath the seabed, dissolves minerals from the rocks. When it erupts through vents, the water is chilled by the surrounding sea. This makes minerals precipitate as smoky clouds, which can be white or black; other minerals are deposited to form chimneys. black cloud of metal sulfide particles
white cloud of silica and anhydrite particles
710°F 375°C
35°F 2°C 480°F 250°C
mineral deposits
cracks
SMOKING CHIMNEYS
The minerals from black smokers, like this one, can increase the height of a chimney by an incredible 12 in (30 cm) a day. However, the chimneys are fragile, and they collapse when they get too high.
heat from magma below
superheated water
vents and seeps
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LIFE WITHOUT SUNLIGHT The first biologists to explore hydrothermal vents were amazed at the life they saw. Masses of limpets, shrimps, sea anemones, and tube worms cluster close to the vents, beside unusually large clams and mussels. White crabs and a few fish, such as the eelpout, scrabble among them. Not every vent system is the same: in the Atlantic, there are no tube worms, clams, or mussels, but lots of white shrimp. Some animals that live in darkness depend on sunlit waters for their food supply, but vent animals are remarkable in that they do not need sunlight for energy. White mats of bacteria around vents are the key. They oxidize sulfides from the vent water to make energy, and VENT FISH are the vent animals’ food source. This fish, called an eelpout, Some animals have the bacteria feeds on mussels, shrimp, and crabs living around vents. living inside their bodies. GHOSTLY CRAB
The hydrothermal vent crab is one of many vent creatures. Each year, about 35 new species living around vents are being described by scientists.
DIFFERENT ANIMAL COMMUNITIES
Animal communities vary between vent systems. Vents on the MidAtlantic Ridge are inhabited by swarms of rift shrimp (shown here), feeding on sulfide-fixing bacteria, but there are no giant clams.
COLD SEEPS
OCEAN SMOKER
This black smoker, seen from Alvin, is similar to the one that scientists first observed in 1977, spewing out dark fluids from deep in the ocean crust.
LIFE ON A SEEP
Mussels containing methane-fixing bacteria live alongside tube worms, soft corals, crabs, and an eelpout at this cold seep, 9,800 feet (3,000 m) down on the seabed near Florida.
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OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
The discovery of hydrothermal vents proved that not all deep-sea life depends on sunlight for energy. Soon, other seabed communities were found that could survive in the dark. In the Gulf of Mexico, diverse animal colonies live in shallow waters near where oil companies drill for petroleum. Here, seeps of methane and other hydrocarbons (compounds containing carbon and hydrogen) ooze up from rocks beneath the sea. Mats of bacteria feed on these cold seeps, providing energy for a food chain that includes soft corals, tube worms, crabs, and fish. Other animal communities in deep-sea trenches off the coasts of Japan and Oregon rely on methane, which is released by tectonic activity. Cold-seep communities may be more common than first thought at depths below 1,800 ft (550 m), although there is often no obvious seepage. Such communities may instead rely on chemical-rich sediments exposed by undersea landslides or currents.
THE TWO POLAR OCEANS are the Arctic
Ocean in the Northern Hemisphere and the Southern Ocean, which surrounds the continent of Antarctica, in the Southern Hemisphere. They differ from other oceans in several respects, not least in the sheer quantity of ice that floats on them. This includes sea ice, which is frozen seawater, and icebergs and ice shelves, which are frozen fresh water. The polar oceans contain fewer temperature layers than other oceans, being uniformly cold, and they have different circulation patterns, which are partly wind-driven but also influenced by such factors as river inflow (in the Arctic Ocean) and sea-ice formation. The edges of the sea ice are biologically productive zones where plankton blooms occur in summer, attracting many fish, birds, and mammals.
P OL A R O C EAN S PENGUINS UNDER THE ICE
These emperor penguins are swimming in a break in the sea ice off the coast of Antarctica. They can dive to 2,000 ft (600 m), staying down for up to 20 minutes.
polar oceans
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ICE SHELVES AN ICE SHELF IS A HUGE FLOATING ice platform, formed where a glacier, or group of glaciers, extends from a continental ice sheet over the sea. The landward side of an ice shelf is fixed to the shore, where there is a continuous inflow of ice from glaciers or ice streams that flow down from the ice sheet. At its front edge, there is usually an ice cliff, from which massive chunks of ice break off (calve) periodically, forming icebergs. Ice shelves are almost entirely an Antarctic phenomenon, with only a few small ones in the Arctic.
PEOPLE
3)2*!-%3#,!2+2/33 The British naval officer Sir James Clark Ross (1800-1862) spent his early adulthood exploring the Arctic. In 1839, he set off to find the south magnetic pole, and on January 11, 1840 reached Antarctica, near the western side of what is now called the Ross Sea. Later, Ross and his crew discovered an ice cliff 165 ft (50 m) high. This was later named the Ross Ice Shelf.
ANTARCTIC ICE SHELVES Fimbul Ice Shelf Lazerov Ice Shelf Ekstrom Ice Shelf
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Larsen Ice Shelf
Amery Ice Shelf
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Ronne Ice Shelf
George VI Sound Abbot Ice Shelf
West Ice Shelf
A N TA R C T I C A Shackleton Ice Shelf
Ross Ice Shelf Getz Ice Shelf
Voyeykov Ice Shelf
ICE-SHELF LOCATIONS
The two largest ice shelves—the Ross and Ronne–Filchner ice shelves—sit on either side of west Antarctica.
Cook Ice Shelf
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
STRUCTURE AND BEHAVIOR Every ice shelf is anchored to the sea floor (ending at a point called the grounding line) and has a front part that floats. The front part is usually 330–3,300 ft (100–1,000 m) thick, though only about one-ninth protrudes above water. The back of an ice shelf is fixed while the front part moves with the tides, creating stresses that can lead to the formation of cracks. Overall, there is a gradual movement of ice from the rear to the front of an ice shelf, from where large tabular icebergs occasionally calve. There is sometimes also a slow upward migration of ice, due to seawater freezing to the bottom of a shelf CALVING SHELF and the ice on the upper surface melting and evaporating in summer. Even deposits The front part of an ice shelf will sometimes break up and the pieces from the sea floor under an ice shelf are drift off as tabular icebergs. Each sometimes brought to the surface by piece visible here has a surface area of several square miles. this mechanism.
S
GAINS AND LOSSES
An ice shelf gains ice from glaciers flowing into its landward end, from new snowfall, and from seawater freezing to its undersurface. It loses ice by iceberg calving, by some summer melting of its upper surface and through evaporation, and by melting of part of on its undersurface.
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This massive ice cliff was photographed at the
Ice shelves surround about 44 percent of the continent seaward edge of the Riiser-Larsen Ice Shelf. front of it, emperor penguins line up to of Antarctica and cover an area of some 600,000 square In enter the water at Atka Bay, miles (1.5 million square km). The largest is the Ross on the Weddell Sea. Ice Shelf, also called the Great Ice Barrier, discovered by Sir James Clark Ross (see panel, above). It is as large as mainland France, with an area of about 190,000 square miles (500,000 square km) and is fed by seven different ice streams. The second largest, the Ronne–Filchner Ice Shelf, covers about 160,000 square miles (430,000 square km). About 15 or so other ice shelves are dotted around the edge of the continent. Since 1995, a few of the smaller ice shelves around the Antarctic Peninsula, including parts of the Larsen Ice Shelf, have disintegrated, most probably as a result of ocean warming (see p.487).
Ross Sea Sulzberger Ice Shelf
ICE CLIFF
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Tide Cracks
Icebergs cti c ic e-she et
Floating ice shelf
Sea level rises and falls with tide Grounded ice
Freezing of seawater onto underside of ice shelf Melting of ice at depth Grounding line
ice shelves
SURFACE AND INTERIOR
BENEATH THE ICE SHELVES
The upper surfaces of Antarctic ice shelves are inhospitable places. For most of the year, cold air streams called katabatic winds blow down from the Antarctic Ice Sheet and over the ice shelves. The surface of the ice is not flat, but is shaped by the winds into a series of ridges and troughs, called sastrugi. These are typically covered in a snow blanket. In some areas, the surface is littered with rocks from the input glacier or glaciers, or even with material that has been carried upward from the sea floor by vertical movement. In summer, small ponds form on some ice shelves and provide a home for various types of microscopic organisms. Internally, an ice shelf usually contains some tide-induced cracks and crevasses.
Underneath the Antarctic ice shelves are extensive bodies of water that are some of the least explored regions on Earth. Seawater is thought to circulate constantly here, caused partly by new ice formation underneath and around the ice shelves. As new ice forms, it “rejects” salt, making the surrounding seawater denser. This causes the seawater to sink, and helps drive the circulation. Recent attempts have been made to explore these areas, using robotic submarines to take measurements. Little is known about the organisms that LIFE UNDER THE ICE live here, although in 2005 a community Organisms such as starfish and of clams and bacterial mats was found on worms live in shallow water the sea floor under the Larsen B Ice Shelf around the edge of Antarctica, and possibly under the ice shelves. after it broke up (see p.487).
CAVE INSIDE AN ICE SHELF
In summer, the internal cracks and crevasses in an ice shelf may enlarge to form caves as some of the ice melts.
new ice ice platelets rise as density decreases
low-salinity water
annually reforming fast ice
marine ice is found beneath sea level
ice shelf
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melting zone
SEAWATER CIRCULATION
A continuous circulation of seawater is thought to occur under large ice shelves, driven by seaice formation on its undersurface and partial melting at depth.
high-salinity water grounding line ice pump driven by salt rejection
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
194
polar oceans
ICEBERGS
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
ICEBERGS ARE HUGE, FLOATING chunks of ice that have broken off, or been calved, from the edges of large glaciers and ice shelves. These chunks range from car-sized objects to vast slabs of ice that are bigger than some countries. It is estimated that each year, 40,000 to 50,000 substantial icebergs are calved from the glaciers of Greenland. A smaller number of gigantic icebergs break off the ice shelves around Antarctica. Surface currents carry icebergs away from their points of origin into the open ocean, where they drift and slowly melt. They can last for years and are a considerable danger to shipping.
SIZES AND COLORS Icebergs include pieces of ice that are hundreds of square miles in area, down to ones the size of houses (bergy bits) or cars (growlers). Tabular icebergs may rise to a height of up to 200 ft (60 m) above the sea surface and extend underwater to a depth of up to 1,000 ft (300 m). Most icebergs appear white because of the lightreflecting properties of air bubbles trapped in the ice. Those made of dense, bubble-free ice absorb all but the shortest (blue) light wavelengths and so have a vivid blue tint. Occasionally, icebergs roll over and expose a previously submerged section to view, which appears aqua green because of algae growing in the ice.
ICEBERG PROPERTIES
ICEBERG PROPORTIONS
Because pure ice is 90 percent as dense as seawater, an iceberg made entirely of ice will have only 10 percent of its mass visible above water.
Icebergs consist principally of frozen fresh water, with no salt content. This is because they originate not from seawater but from glaciers or ice shelves (floating glaciers), and glaciers themselves come from compacted snow. Typically, an iceberg has a temperature of about 5 to –4˚F (–15 to –20˚C) at its core and 32˚F (0˚C) at its surface. In addition to ice, some icebergs contain rock debris. This is material that has fallen onto the parent glacier from surrounding mountains, or frozen to the glacier’s edges, and eventually becomes incorporated into the ice. An iceberg’s rock load affects its buoyancy. An iceberg with a high rock content may float up to 93 percent submerged.
RANGE OF SHAPES
Icebergs come in a range of shapes including tabular (flat-topped), domed, pinnacled or pyramidal, wedge-shaped, and various irregular shapes, as shown here. TABULAR
PINNACLED
IRREGULAR
DOMED
icebergs
NORTH ATLANTIC ICEBERGS
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HUMAN IMPACT
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Most icebergs seen in the north Atlantic begin as snow falling on Greenland. This snow eventually becomes ice, which over thousands of years is transported from the Greenland ice sheet down to the sea as glaciers. Icebergs calved from ARCTIC OCEAN the glaciers on the west coast of Greenland (and many from the Ellesmere Greenland Island G east coast) move into Baffin Bay. Sea R E The Labrador Current carries E N these icebergs southeast, past ICELAND Humboldt Newfoundland, into the north Hayes Atlantic. There, most of the icebergs rapidly melt, but a few Baffin Jakobshavn reach as far south as 40˚N— Bay around the same latitude as New York and Lisbon. Arctic
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ICELANDIC ICEBERGS
These massive icebergs were calved from Breidamerkurjökull, a glacier in Iceland, and form a surreal tourist attraction, drifting in the glacial lagoon.
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All Southern Ocean icebergs have ANTARCTICA broken off one of the ice shelves that Minimum extent of surround Antarctica (see p.192). Most sea ice start off as extremely large, tabular e eb icebergs—satellite monitoring of their of I c Maximum Limit extent of drift tracks has provided useful information C L E A sea ice A R about Southern Ocean currents. After N ST AU calving, these icebergs drift westward around Antarctica in a coastal current (the East Wind Drift). A few are carried in an eastward direction by DISTRIBUTION the Antarctic Circumpolar Current. In extreme cases, The approximate limit of iceberg drift from Antarctica they drift farther, reaching as far north as 42˚S in the is shown by the red dotted Atlantic Ocean. The largest Southern Ocean iceberg line. Most Southern Ocean ever recorded measured 180 miles (290 km) long and icebergs remain close to the Antarctic Circle at 67˚S. 25 miles (40 km) wide—about the size of Jamaica.
Icebergs that contain rock debris gradually release this material as they melt, and the debris sinks to the sea floor. DIRTY ICEBERG Thus rock fragments can The fact that this iceberg contains considerable amounts of rock and dust is plain from its be transported from “dirty” appearance. This rock will end up on the Greenland, for example, sea floor as ice-rafted material. to the bottom of the north Atlantic. The process is called ice rafting. By examining sediment samples taken from the ocean floor, scientists can often identify rock fragments that have been transported in this way. Such studies can provide clues about past patterns of iceberg calving and iceberg distribution. For example, they have shown that there were short cold periods during the last ice age, called Heinrich Events, when vast armadas of icebergs were calved and crossed the Atlantic eastward from the coast of Labrador.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
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Most north Atlantic icebergs are calved by glaciers in west Greenland, such as the Jakobshavn and Hayes glaciers.
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ORIGINS AND DISTRIBUTION
NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN
WRECK OF THE TITANIC
The Titanic’s bow section, of which the upper deck and railings are seen here, is mostly intact, although deeply embedded in the seafloor.
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polar oceans
SEA ICE TESTING THE ICE
at the ocean surface and floats on the liquid seawater underneath. It includes pack ice—ice that is not attached to the shoreline and drifts with wind and currents—and fast ice, which is frozen to a coast. Sea-ice formation and melting influences the large-scale circulation of water in the oceans. It has important stabilizing effects on the world’s climate, since it helps control the movement of heat energy between the polar oceans and atmosphere. Sea ice strongly reflects solar radiation, so in summer it reduces heating of the polar oceans. In winter, it acts as an insulator, reducing heat loss. Today, scientists are concerned about shrinking sea ice in the Arctic because of its possible effects on climate and wildlife. SEA ICE IS SEAWATER THAT HAS FROZEN
Pancake ice, consisting of ice platelets, can be up to 4 in (10 cm) thick. Waves and wind have caused these platelets to collide, hence their curled-up edges.
FORMATION Seawater starts to freeze when it reaches a temperature of 28.8˚F (1.8˚C), slightly cooler than the freezing point of fresh water. Sea-ice formation starts with the appearance of tiny needlelike ice crystals (frazil ice) in the water. Salt in seawater cannot be incorporated into ice, and the crystals expel salt. The developing sea ice gradually turns into a thick slush and then, under typical wave conditions, into a mosaic of ice platelets called pancake ice. Subsequently, it consolidates into a thick, solid sheet, through processes such as “rafting” (in which the ice fractures and one piece overrides another) and “ridging” (where lines of broken ice are forced up by pressure). Where ridging occurs, each ridge has a corresponding structure, a keel, that forms on the underside of the ice. Newly formed, compacted sheet ice is called first-year ice and may be up to 12 in (30 cm) thick. It continues to thicken through the winter. Any ice that remains through to the next winter is called multi-year ice.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
HOW ICE FORMS
The stages of sea ice formation vary according to whether the sea surface is calm or affected by waves. A typical sequence in an area of moderate wave action is shown below.
GREASE ICE
PANCAKE ICE
FIRST-YEAR ICE
MULTI-YEAR ICE
Fine ice spicules, called frazils, appear in the water. These coagulate into a viscous soup of ice crystals, called grease ice.
Wave action causes the grease ice to break into slushy balls of ice, called shuga. These clump into platter shapes called pancakes.
The ice pancakes congeal, consolidate, and thicken through processes such as rafting and ridging to form a continuous sheet of ice.
Further thickening, for a year or more, produces multi-year ice. This has a rough surface and may be several yards thick.
sea ice DISCOVERY
The extent of sea ice in the polar oceans varies over an annual cycle. About 85 percent of the winter ice that forms in the Southern Ocean melts in summer, and on average this ice only reaches a thickness of a yard or two. In the Arctic, much of the ice lasts for several seasons, and this multi-year ice attains a greater thickness—on average 7–10 ft (2–3 m). In winter, pack ice covers most of the Arctic Ocean. In summer, it usually halves in area. In recent years, the summer retreat has been more pronounced, raising fears that the Arctic ice coverage may disappear Arct altogether over the next ic C ir 30 to 40 years.
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ARCTIC SEA ICE COVERAGE
ARCTIC OCEAN
Coverage varies from a winter high of 6 million square miles (15 million square km) to a summer low of less than 3 million square miles (7 million square km). year-round ice winter sea ice
GAPS IN THE ICE
ICE LEAD
An ice lead forms when an area of sea ice shears. Stresses from winds and water currents are thought to be the cause. Here, a group of beluga whales swims along a lead.
Even in parts of the polar oceans that are more or less permanently ice-covered, gaps and breaks sometimes appear or persist in the ice. These openings vary greatly in size and extent and have different names. Fractures are extremely narrow ruptures that are usually not navigable by boats of any size. An ice lead is a long, straight, narrow passageway that opens up spontaneously in sea ice, making it navigable by surface vessels and some marine mammals. Polynyas are persistent regions of open water, up to a few hundred square miles in area and often roughly circular in shape. They sometimes develop where there is upwelling of warmer water in a localized area, or near coasts where the wind blows new sea ice away from the shore as it forms.
LIFE AROUND THE ICE
)#%"2%!+%23 )CEBREAKERSARESHIPSDESIGNEDFOR MOVINGTHROUGHICE COVERED ENVIRONMENTS!NICEBREAKERHAS AREINFORCEDHULLANDABOWSHAPE THATCAUSESTHESHIPTORIDEOVER SEAICEANDCRUSHITASITMOVES FORWARD4HESHAPEOFTHEVESSEL CLEARSTHEICEDEBRISTOTHESIDES ANDUNDERNEATHTHEHULL ALLOWING STEADYFORWARDPROGRESS!MODERN ICEBREAKERCANADVANCETHROUGHSEA ICEUPTOFTM THICK
These crustaceans form an important
part of the food chain in the Life thrives around sea ice. One reason for this is that as ice forms, Southern Ocean, where they salt is expelled into the seawater, causing it to become denser and congregate in dense masses. sink. This forces nutrient-laden water to the surface. In summer, the combination of nutrients and sunlight encourages the growth of phytoplankton, which provide a rich food source. These organisms form the base of a food chain for fish, mammals, and birds. In the Arctic, sea ice provides a resting and birthing place for seals and walruses and a hunting and breeding ground for polar bears and Arctic foxes. In the Antarctic, it supports seals and penguins. Breaks in the ice are vital to this wildlife. Seals, penguins, and whales rely on them for access to the air, while polar bears hunt near them. Decreases in Arctic sea ice would drastically shrink some habitats, pushing them toward extinction. WEDDELL SEAL
The Weddell seal, found only in the Antarctic, is one of nine seal species that inhabit polar oceans. Weddell seals never stray far from sea ice.
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
HUMAN IMPACT
ANTARCTIC KRILL
200
polar oceans
POLAR OCEAN CIRCULATION THE ARCTIC AND SOUTHERN OCEANS each have their own unique patterns of water flow, which link in with the rest of the global ocean circulation. These flows are driven partly by wind and partly by various factors that influence the temperature and salinity of the surface waters in these oceans—including seasonal variations in air temperature and sea ice coverage, and large inflows of fresh water from rivers. Although driven by similar influences, the significantly different water-flow patterns of these two oceans are largely due to the fact that the Arctic Ocean is encircled by land, whereas the Southern Ocean surrounds a frozen continent.
ARCTIC SURFACE CIRCULATION The upper 170 ft (50 m) of the Arctic Ocean is affected by currents that keep it in constant motion. There are two main components to this circulation (see p.428–29). In a large area north of Alaska, there is a slow, circular motion of water called the Beaufort Gyre. This clockwise movement is wind-generated and completes one rotation every four years. The second component, the Transpolar Current, is driven by a vast quantity of water discharged into the Arctic Ocean from Siberian rivers. MOUTH OF THE LENA RIVER
OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS
The Lena flows across Siberia and discharges 100 cubic miles (420 cubic km) of water into the Arctic Ocean every year.
CIRCULATION AND FEEDING
The Southern Ocean meets warmer water at the Antarctic Convergence, creating a biologically rich feeding area for whales, including these humpbacks.
OCEAN LIFE
BY FAR THE LARGEST HABITAT on Earth,
the oceans are more accurately seen as a great range of environments as disparate as mangrove swamps and deep-sea vents. Living organisms have found a place to take hold in every ocean environment, even the deepest trenches, more than 6 miles (10 km) beneath the surface. Ocean life teems with greatest abundance and variety in the sunlit surface waters. Here, microscopic plants and plantlike organisms, the phytoplankton, fuel productive communities of organisms right up to top predators, such as killer whales. Life began in the oceans, and they were the site of many groundbreaking steps in evolution. Tracing the history of this evolution puts into context the astonishing variety of today’s marine life.
INTR ODUCTION TO OCEAN LIFE KELP FOREST COMMUNITY
Ocean life develops into one of a number of characteristic communities, according to physical conditions. Here in cool, shallow water, a canopy of kelp towers above an undergrowth of encrusting red seaweed, while an eagle ray and smaller fish find shelter among the kelp fronds.
206
introduction to ocean life
CLASSIFICATION them into a universally accepted framework, scientists have created a massive reference system that accommodates all forms of life. Over 2 million organisms have been described, but only about 16 percent live in the oceans. The marine proportion is likely to increase, as many new species continue to be discovered annually, particularly in the deep ocean.
BY CLASSIFYING ORGANISMS AND FITTING
,)..!%!.()%2!2#(9
,INNAEUSUSEDAHIERARCHYOFRANKEDCATEGORIESOF INCREASINGEXCLUSIVENESS4ODAYSEXPANDEDSYSTEM INCLUDESMANYRANKS FROMDOMAINDOWNTOSPECIES "ELOWISANEXAMPLEOFASERIESOFRANKEDCATEGORIES ILLUSTRATINGTHOSETHATCLASSIFYTHECOMMONDOLPHIN DOMAIN Eucarya Includes all eukaryotes—organisms that have complex cells with distinct nuclei. Only bacteria and archaea fall outside this domain. KINGDOM Animalia Includes all animals—multicellular eukaryotes that need to eat food for energy. All animals are mobile for at least part of their lives. PHYLUM Chordata Includes all chordates—animals possessing a notochord. In most cases, the notochord is replaced before birth by the backbone. CLASS Mammalia Includes all mammals—air-breathing chordates that feed their young on milk. The jaw is made up of a single bone. ORDER Cetacea Includes all cetaceans (whales and dolphins)— marine mammals that have a tail with boneless, horizontal flukes for propulsion. FAMILY Delphinidae Includes all dolphins (a subgroup of toothed cetaceans) with beaks and 50–100 vertebrae. The skull lacks a crest. GENUS Delphinus Includes a few colorful, oceanic dolphins with 40–50 teeth on each side of the jaw. These dolphins form large social groups. SPECIES Delphinus delphis Specifies a single type of dolphin with a V-shaped black cape under the dorsal fin and crisscross hourglass patterning on its sides.
PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION
7(!4)3 !30%#)%3 !SPECIESISTHEBASICUNITOF CLASSIFICATION/NECOMMONLY ACCEPTEDDEFINITIONOFASPECIES ISAPOPULATIONOFORGANISMSTHAT HAVESOMANYFEATURESINCOMMON THATTHEYFORMADISTINCTGROUP THATINTERBREEDS PRODUCINGFERTILE OFFSPRINGINNATURALCONDITIONS 4HISDEFINITIONCANNOTBEAPPLIED TOFOSSILSPECIES4HEREARESCORES OFOTHERSPECIESDEFINITIONS SOMEOFWHICHINCORPORATEBOTH FOSSILANDLIVINGSPECIES)NTHE END ASPECIESCANOFTENBE DEFINEDRATHERSUBJECTIVELY
Classification helps us make sense of the natural world by grouping organisms on the basis of features that they share. It gives scientists a clear and accurate understanding of the diversity of life, and because everyone uses the same system, the knowledge is accessible on a worldwide basis. The hierarchical system devised by the Swedish scientist Carolus Linnaeus (see panel, left) in the 18th century still forms the basis of today’s classification. Each species is identified with a unique two-part scientific name (made up of the genus and species name) then filed in a series of everlarger groupings. However, as our knowledge increases, it is often necessary to revise the groups. Sometimes, this leads to subdivision of categories—for example, phylum Arthropoda has been split into the subphyla Crustacea and Hexapoda. Frequently, a new species is identified when it is shown to be distinct from other populations.
THE EVIDENCE In the past, scientists could identify and classify organisms only by studying anatomy, by looking at form, function, and embryological development (animals only), and by examining the fossil record. Recently, scientists have also been able to investigate organisms by looking at their proteins and their DNA. DNA is a DETAILED ANATOMY complex molecule whose sequential By making a detailed anatomical examination structure is unique to each organism. of material in museum The relatedness of organisms can collections, scientists be determined by comparing these can distinguish between DNA molecules for shared features. similar organisms and This molecular evidence has led to classify them according many revisions of classification. to shared characters. ANIMALS WITH A SKULL A skull is a derived character that unites all the organisms below. The skull is said to have evolved in their common ancestor.
OCEAN LIFE
CLADISTICS JAWED VERTEBRATES By the 1950s, although most people used the same system of Animals beyond this point form a clade of classification, the criteria they used for placing organisms in organisms with jaws, again assumed to have categories were often neither measurable nor repeatable. been inherited from a common ancestor. The idea emerged to analyze many characters using an automatic, computer-like process, not only to classify BONY VERTEBRATES organisms, but also to trace their evolution. All animals beyond this point form a clade This process became known as cladistics, possessing an inherited bony skeleton, not shared by sharks, lampreys, or hagfish. and it is a widely used technique today. LAMPREY A cladistic analysis examines a wide HAGFISH FISH CLADOGRAM selection of characters shared by a study group RAY-FINNED FISH This simplified of organisms. It finds the most likely pattern of Below is a clade of fish with fins cladogram indicates made up of radiating bones only, evolutionary changes that link the organisms, just three of the steps without the limblike lobes of used to classify fish. involving the least number of steps (evolutionary lobe-fins, or limbs of tetrapods. CARTILAGINOUS FISH Clades include all the branching points). It then arranges the organisms descendants of a common in a tree diagram (cladogram) that reflects their ancestor, so some new groups, such relationships. A cladogram is made up of nested as “lobe-finned fish and tetrapods” groups called clades. A clade encompasses all result, since all tetrapods (land LOBE-FINNED FISH RAY-FINNED FISH the descendants of the group’s common ancestor. vertebrates) descend from lobe-fins. AND TETRAPODS
classification
MARINE LIFE in this book is shown on the following three pages. In this framework, all living things are divided into three domains. Within domains, only the marine groups are shown,
THE CLASSIFICATION FRAMEWORK USED
BACTERIA DOMAIN
Bacteria
KINGDOMS
10
although the numbers of classes and species cited include all organisms within the group whether they are marine or not. Some groupings, such as protists, are shown in dotted lines because although they are useful categories, they are not true, taxonomic groups. Others, such as small, bottom-living phyla and planktonic phyla, are ecological groupings and do not reflect taxonomy or evolutionary history.
ARCHAEA SPECIES
many millions
DOMAIN
Archaea
KINGDOMS
EUKARYOTES
207
EUKARYOTES 3
many millions
SPECIES
DOMAIN
Eucarya
KINGDOMS
At least 15
2 million
SPECIES
GREEN SEAWEEDS
that have cells with a nucleus and other complex structures not seen in prokaryotes (bacteria, archaea). The eukaryotes comprise protists, seaweeds, plants, fungi, and animals. THIS DOMAIN INCLUDES ALL ORGANISMS
CLASSES
Ulvophyceae, Cladophorophyceae, Bryopsidophyceae, Dasycladophyceae SPECIES
1,200
+ SIX MORE CLASSES OF GREEN ALGAE
MOSSES Bryophyta
DIVISION
Protists At least 10
KINGDOMS
SPECIES
More than 100,000
organisms formed a single kingdom, but apart from size, there is little to unite them. Their classification is in flux, but in this book, they are presented as a mixture of kingdoms and informal groups.
CLASSES
3
SPECIES
10,000
CLASSES
8
SPECIES
250,000
ORDERS
30
SPECIES
235,000
VASCULAR PLANTS Trachaeophyta
DIVISION
UNTIL RECENTLY, THESE TINY, SINGLE-CELLED
Diatoms Informal group
Dinoflagellata
Chrysophyta
10,000
Fungi CLASSES
4
SPECIES
4,000
CLASSES
3
SPECIES
720
KINGDOM
Radiolarians Radiolaria
Foraminifera
CLASSES
4
SPECIES
4,100
CLASSES
2–3
SPECIES
10,000
Ciliata
4
SPECIES
600,000
Animalia
PHYLA
About 30
SPECIES
Over 1.5 million
progresses from organisms with simple body plans and systems, such as sponges, to the most complex phylum, chordates, which contains humans. Each phylum represents a distinct body plan.
SPONGES
Ciliates KINGDOM
PHYLA
THE FOLLOWING LIST OF ANIMAL PHYLA
Foraminiferans KINGDOM
Fungi
Animals KINGDOM
KINGDOM
Angiospermae
+ SEVEN NON-MARINE CLASSES
SPECIES
Golden Algae KINGDOM
CLASS
+ THREE NON-MARINE DIVISIONS
2
CLASSES
Dinoflagellates KINGDOM
FLOWERING PLANTS
PHYLUM
Porifera
CLASSES
3
SPECIES
15,000
CLASSES
4
SPECIES
9,000
ORDERS
10
SPECIES
6,000
ORDERS
4
SPECIES
200
ORDERS
1
SPECIES
16
ORDERS
7
SPECIES
2,700
CNIDARIANS PHYLUM
3
CLASSES
SPECIES
Cnidaria
10,000
CORALS AND ANEMONES
Coccolithophorids Informal group
CLASS
1
CLASSES
SPECIES
200
JELLYFISH CLASS
+ SEVERAL MORE INFORMAL GROUPS AND KINGDOMS
Anthozoa
Scyphozoa
BOX JELLYFISH
Red seaweeds KINGDOM
Rhodophyta
CLASS
1 or more
CLASSES
SPECIES
Cubozoa
HYDROIDS
5,500
CLASS
Hydrozoa
Brown seaweeds KINGDOM
Phaeophyta
1
CLASSES
SPECIES
2,000
PLANKTONIC PHYLA
Plants KINGDOM
Plantae
6
DIVISIONS
SPECIES
283,000
GREEN PLANTS HERE COMPRISE SIX DIVISIONS, with
CLASSES
PHYLUM
At least 4
SPECIES
16,000
SPECIES
200
GREEN ALGAE CLASS
Prasinophyceae
PHYLUM
Ctenophora
CLASSES
2
SPECIES
100
CLASSES
2
SPECIES
70
CLASSES
3
SPECIES
2,000
ARROW WORMS
GREEN SEAWEEDS AND ALGAE Chlorophyta
COMB JELLIES
Chaetognatha
ROTIFERANS ORDERS
1
PHYLUM
Rotifera
OCEAN LIFE
all vascular plants grouped in division Tracheophyta. The Hepatophyta (liverworts), Anthoceraphyta (hornworts), and Lycophyta (clubmosses) are not shown because they have no marine species.
DIVISION
with the ocean currents in the plankton and are grouped here on this basis. The Ctenophora and Chaetognatha contain so few species that they are known as minor phyla.
THE FOLLOWING THREE PHYLA FLOAT
208
introduction to ocean life
FLATWORMS PHYLUM
Platyhelminthes
CLASSES
4
SPECIES
20,000
RIBBON WORMS PHYLUM
Nemertea
Annelida
Gastropoda
CLASS
CLASSES
2
SPECIES
900
CLASSES
3
SPECIES
15,000
Cephalopoda
CLASS
Polyplacophora
CLASS
Arthropoda
PHYLUM
Vestimentifera
CLASSES
1
SPECIES
10
CLASSES
1
SPECIES
110
CLASSES
2
SPECIES
140
CLASSES
2
SPECIES
300
Brachiopoda
SPECIES
650
ORDERS
3
SPECIES
500
CLASSES
17
SPECIES
1.1 million
CRUSTACEANS Crustacea
SUBPHYLUM
CLASSES
6
SPECIES
50,000
CLASS
Branchiopoda
ORDERS
4
SPECIES
900
CLASS
Maxillopoda
ORDERS
23
SPECIES
13,000
CLASS
Ostracoda
ORDERS
5
SPECIES
7,000
ORDERS
16
SPECIES
30,000
FAMILIES
4
SPECIES
350
FAMILIES
94
SPECIES
10,000
MALACOSTRACANS
LAMP SHELLS PHYLUM
4
MUSSEL SHRIMPS
SPOON WORMS Echiura
ORDERS
BARNACLES AND COPEPODS
POGONOPHORAN WORMS
PHYLUM
35,000
WATER FLEAS AND RELATIVES
GIANT TUBE WORMS
Pogonophora
SPECIES
ARTHROPODS
MEMBERS OF THE FOLLOWING PHYLA all live in or on the ocean floor. The list is not comprehensive—the following phyla are among those not included: Entoprocta, Acanthocephala, Placozoa, and Loricifera.
PHYLUM
16
CHITONS
BOTTOM-LIVING PHYLA
PHYLUM
ORDERS
CEPHALOPODS
SEGMENTED WORMS PHYLUM
GASTROPODS
CLASS
Malacostraca
MANTIS SHRIMPS
HORSESHOE WORMS PHYLUM
Phoronida
ORDER
CLASSES
1
SPECIES
12
CLASSES
2
SPECIES
320
ISOPODS ORDER
PEANUT WORMS PHYLUM
Sipuncula
ORDER
Cycliophora
CLASSES
1
SPECIES
ORDER
Gastrotricha
Amphipoda
FAMILI ES
119
SPECIES
10,000
FAMILIES
2
SPECIES
90
FAMILIES
105
SPECIES
8,500
CLASSES
1
SPECIES
1,000
CLASSES
13
SPECIES
70,000
KRILL
1
GASTROTRICHS PHYLUM
Isopoda
AMPHIPODS
CYCLIOPHORANS PHYLUM
Stomatopoda
Euphausiacea
LOBSTERS, CRABS, AND SHRIMPS CLASSES
1
SPECIES
430
ORDER
Decapoda
+ 11 MORE MINOR ORDERS
ROUND WORMS PHYLUM
Nematoda
CLASSES
2
SPECIES
20,000
SEA SPIDERS SUBPHYLUM
PRIAPULA WORMS PHYLUM
Priapulida
CLASSES
1
SPECIES
17
CHELICERATES SUBPHYLUM
MUD DRAGONS PHYLUM
Kinorhyncha
2
SPECIES
CLASSES
2
SPECIES
400
CLASSES
1
SPECIES
24
CLASSES
150
WATER BEARS PHYLUM
Tardigrada
Pycnogonida Chelicerata
SPIDERS, SCORPIONS, TICKS, AND MITES CLASS
Arachnida
ORDERS
12
SPECIES
70,000
ORDERS
1
SPECIES
4
SPECIES
950,000
HORSESHOE CRABS CLASS
Merostomata
PTEROBRANCH WORMS PHYLUM
Pterobranchia
INSECTS SUBPHYLUM
ACORN WORMS PHYLUM
Enteropneusta
Insecta
CLASSES
6
+ 1 NON-MARINE SUBPHYLUM: MILLIPEDES AND CENTIPEDES (MYRIAPODA) CLASSES
1
SPECIES
70
ECHINODERMS PHYLUM
MOLLUSKS PHYLUM
Mollusca
CLASSES
8
SPECIES
50,000
CAUDOFOVEATES CLASS
Caudofoveata
ORDERS
1
SPECIES
70
SOLENOGASTRES
OCEAN LIFE
CLASS
Solenogaster
ORDERS
4
SPECIES
180
MONOPLACOPHORANS CLASS
Monoplacophora
ORDERS
1
SPECIES
8
ORDERS
2
SPECIES
350
TUSK SHELLS CLASS
Scaphopoda Bivalvia
CLASSES
6
SPECIES
7,000
CLASS
Crinoidea
ORDERS
5
SPECIES
630
ORDERS
5
SPECIES
1,500
ORDERS
3
SPECIES
2,000
ORDERS
15
SPECIES
940
ORDERS
6
SPECIES
1,150
ORDERS
1
SPECIES
2
STARFISH CLASS
Asteroidea
BRITTLESTARS CLASS
Ophiuroidea
SEA URCHINS CLASS
Echinoidea
SEA CUCUMBERS
BIVALVES CLASS
Echinodermata
SEA LILIES AND FEATHER STARS
KINGDOM
Holothuroidea
SEA DAISIES ORDERS
13
SPECIES
14,000
KINGDOM
Concentricycloidea
classification
209
CHORDATES PHYLUM
Chordata
3
SUBPHYLA
SPECIES
51,500 CLINGFISH
The remaining two, much smaller, subphyla are united with vertebrates by the presence of the rodlike notochord, which becomes the backbone before birth in vertebrates.
THE VERTEBRATES DOMINATE PHYLUM CHORDATA.
ORDER
Gobiesociformes
PIPEFISH AND SEAHORSES SPECIES
120
SPECIES
186
SPECIES
312
NEEDLEFISH ORDER
Beloniformes
TUNICATES (SEA SQUIRTS AND SALPS) Urochordata
SUBPHYLUM
CLASSES
4
SPECIES
ORDER
SPECIES
121
DORIES AND RELATIVES ORDER
Cephalochordata
CLASSES
1
SPECIES
25
VERTEBRATES
Zeiformes
Scorpaeniformes
SPECIES
240
SPECIES
SPECIES
ORDER
Perciformes
1,326
SPECIES
9,500
SPECIES
572
SPECIES
353
FLATFISH ORDER
Pleuronectiformes
PUFFERS AND FILEFISH
42
ORDER
Tetraodontiformes
STICKLEBACKS AND SEAMOTHS ORDER
Gasterosteiformes
SPECIES
16
+ 17 MORE ORDERS
Vertebrata
SUBPHYLUM
Beryciformes
ORDER
PERCH-LIKE FISH
SQUIRRELFISH AND RELATIVES
2,000
LANCELETS SUBPHYLUM
Atheriniformes
Syngnathiformes
SCORPIONFISH AND FLATHEADS
SILVERSIDES ORDER
ORDER
CLASSES
7
SPECIES
Over 49,500
MANY AUTHORITIES EXCLUDE HAGFISH from the vertebrates due to their poorly developed vertebral column. They include hagfish within a larger group called the Craniata, meaning animals possessing a skull (cranium).
REPTILES CLASS
Reptilia
ORDERS
4
SPECIES
7,700
FAMILIES
12
SPECIES
300
FAMILIES
44
SPECIES
7,400
FAMILIES
3
SPECIES
23
TURTLES
FISHES
ORDER
“FISHES” IS AN INFORMAL TERM for five distinct groups of animals. The bony fishes do not form a self-contained group, because all land vertebrates (tetrapods) descend from lobe-finned fish. Bony fishes are a natural group only if tetrapods are placed within the lobe-fin group.
SNAKES AND LIZARDS ORDER
BIRDS
Myxinoidea
ORDERS
1
50
SPECIES
ORDERS 29 SPECIES 9,500 birds have been divided into 29 orders. Some scientists consider birds to be grouped within the reptiles. CLASS
Aves
IN THIS CLASSIFICATION, the
LAMPREYS CLASS
Petromyzontida
ORDERS
1
38
SPECIES
WATERFOWL (DUCKS, GEESE, AND SWANS) ORDER
CARTILAGINOUS FISHES CLASS
Chondrichthyes
10
1,114
SPECIES
Elasmobranchii
ORDERS
9
1,080
SPECIES
2
SPECIES
149
ORDER
Sphenisciformes
FAMILIES
1
SPECIES
17
ORDER
Gaviiformes
FAMILIES
1
SPECIES
5
FAMILIES
4
SPECIES
108
FAMILIES
1
SPECIES
22
FAMILIES
5
SPECIES
65
FAMILIES
7
SPECIES
119
FAMILIES
3
SPECIES
307
FAMILIES
14
SPECIES
343
FAMILIES
9
SPECIES
191
ALBATROSSES AND PETRELS
8
FAMILIES
29
SPECIES
480
FAMILIES
12
SPECIES
600
ORDER
Procellariiformes
GREBES
SKATES AND RAYS ORDERS
FAMILIES
DIVERS
SHARKS ORDERS
Anatidiformes
PENGUINS
ORDERS
SHARKS AND RAYS SUBCLASS
Crocodylia
+ 1 NON-MARINE ORDER: THE TUATARAS (SPHENODONTIDA)
HAGFISH CLASS
Squamata
CROCODILES ORDER
JAWLESS FISHES
Chelonia
1
ORDER
Podicipediformes
PELICANS AND RELATIVES
CHIMAERAS SUBCLASS
ORDER
Holocephali
SPECIES
1
SPECIES
Pelicaniformes
34 HERONS AND RELATIVES ORDER
BONY FISHES CLASS Osteichthyes
ORDERS
47
SPECIES
28,000
3
SPECIES
8
LOBE-FINNED FISHES SUBCLASS
Sarcopterygii
Actinopterygii
ORDER
Falconiformes
WADERS, GULLS, AND AUKS
ORDERS
ORDER
Charadriiformes
KINGFISHERS AND RELATIVES
RAY-FINNED FISHES SUBCLASS
Ciconiformes
BIRDS OF PREY
ORDER
ORDERS
44
SPECIES
28,000
Coraciiformes
+ 19 NON-MARINE ORDERS
STURGEONS AND PADDLEFISHES ORDER
Acipenseriformes
SPECIES
25
TARPONS AND TENPOUNDERS ORDER
Elopiformes
SPECIES
Albuliformes
SPECIES
5
Anguilliformes
SPECIES
737
Clupeiformes
SPECIES
397
SPECIES
391
ORDER
Siluriformes Argentiformes
ORDER
Aulopiformes Myctophiformes
ORDER
Lampriformes
ORDER
Gadiformes
SPECIES
27
ORDER
Batrachoidiformes
2,867
SPECIES
227
ORDER
Ophidiiformes
26 SPECIES 5,000 mammal orders are listed here. The pinnipeds (seals, sea lions, and walruses), until recently classified as order Pinnipeda, do not form a natural group, and have been placed within order Carnivora (cats, dogs, bears, otters, and relatives). The 26 mammal orders includes new orders formerly classified as marsupials.
CLASS
Mammalia
ORDERS
THREE PARTLY OR WHOLLY MARINE
SPECIES
SPECIES
228
SPECIES
241 18
SPECIES
475
SPECIES
CARNIVORES ORDER
Carnivora
FAMILIES
9
SPECIES
249
FAMILIES
12
SPECIES
85
FAMILIES
2
SPECIES
4
69
WHALES AND DOLPHINS
CUSK EELS SPECIES
MAMMALS
SPECIES
Cetacea
354
ORDER
300
SEA COWS
ANGLERFISH ORDER
Lophiiformes
SPECIES
ORDER
Sirenia
+ 23 MORE NON-MARINE ORDERS
OCEAN LIFE
Gonorhynchiformes
SMELTS AND RELATIVES ORDER
Stomiiformes
TOADFISH AND MIDSHIPMEN
CATFISH AND KNIFEFISH ORDER
ORDER
COD FISH AND RELATIVES
MILKFISH ORDER
66
VELIFERS, TUBE-EYES, RIBBONFISH
Saccopharyngiformes SPECIES 28
HERRINGS AND RELATIVES ORDER
SPECIES
LANTERNFISH AND RELATIVES
SWALLOWERS AND GULPERS ORDER
Salmoniformes
GRINNERS
EELS ORDER
ORDER
LIGHTFISH AND DRAGONFISH
7
BONEFISH ORDER
SALMONS
RED SEA REEF
The Red Sea is one of the world’s top 18 coral hotspots. Its colorful reefs are home to an abundance of marine life, including the venomous red lionfish.
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biodiversity hotspots Many people have heard of biodiversity hotspots,
Tropical coral reefs are popular with divers because they are colorful, shallow, and easy to reach. As a result, we know far more about life on coral reefs than many other ocean habitats. In 2002, a team of researchers led by Dr. Callum Roberts from the University of York, UK, gathered data on 3,235 different species of reef fish, corals, snails, and lobsters. More than a quarter of the fish and snails and half of the lobsters were localized species found in just a few coral reefs. The study pinpointed 18 coral reef hotspots (shown in red below). These sites cover 35 percent of the world’s total coral reef area but are home to more than 60 percent of rare and localized reef species, so they are a high conservation priority. Richest of all are the reefs of southern Japan, followed by those in western Australia and the Gulf of Guinea, West Africa. The famous Great Barrier Reef, off eastern Australia, came fourth. ARCTIC OCEAN
other coral reef areas
HIDDEN HOTSPOT BURIED RICHES
SOUTHERN OCEAN
abundance of rare and endemic species
SABA BANK During nine dives in 2006, a single diver found 50 species of sponges in Saba Bank off the Netherlands Antilles in the Caribbean. NEW TO SCIENCE The Saba Bank study discovered a sevenspined goby living on the sea bed. It is a new species, and probably a new genus.
FISH HAVEN Soldierfish and snappers gather at a seamount in the Indian Ocean. The upwelling of nutrient-rich currents around seamounts makes them “oases” of the ocean.
PACIFIC OCEAN
INDIAN OCEAN
BENEATH THE SURFACE Underwater, however, Loch Carron is as full of life as any tropical coral reef. Animals include soft corals, dahlia anemones, and brittlestars.
GUADALUPE SEAMOUNT Up to a third of species of seaweed, plants, and animals on isolated seamounts may be unique (or endemic) to that seamount, having evolved there over millions of years.
SAMPLING SEDIMENTS One deep-sea sediment study found 798 species in 233 mud cores collected from a total area the size of an average room. Based on this, scientists estimate there could be up to 10 million species in the seabed.
OCEAN LIFE
ATLANTIC OCEAN
LOCH CARRON The northwest Highlands of Scotland may be scenic, but very little biodiversity is found in the harsh, rocky landscape that surrounds Loch Carron.
CARIBBEAN TREASURE CHEST
CORAL REEF HOTSPOTS
TYPES OF HOTSPOTS
SEAMOUNT COMMUNITIES
particularly in the context of documentaries about ocean life. These sites are very popular with filmmakers for the variety of life they exhibit. However, the term is a slight misnomer. Strictly speaking, such sites are “species diversity hotspots,” places where the largest number of species are concentrated in a small area. Identifying such hotspots helps conservationists to decide where protected areas should be set up. However, places where species diversity is low, such as the ocean trenches, are also important because of the remarkable animals that live there. The problem is that too little is known about the subject for scientists to be sure where the highest species diversity occurs in the ocean, beyond the shallow layer accessible to human divers. Assessments have been made of the richest coral reefs (see below), and of regions with the most seagrasses (see p.146). Another study has found hotspots for sea turtles, tuna, sharks, and other large predators, mainly near islands, shelf breaks, and seamounts. Recent research, including a 2006 study of Saba Bank in the Caribbean (see right) by the Conservation International Marine Rapid Assessment Program, has added to the pool of knowledge. New Zealand and the United States are among the few countries that have tried to locate and assess species diversity hotspots in their territorial waters. However, far too little is known about the deep ocean for all marine hotspots to be identified.
cycles of life and energy
PRODUCTIVITY
UPWELLING
Throughout the world’s oceans, the abundance of marine life varies dramatically. The ocean is more productive in some places and at some times than others. The amount of sunlight is a major influence on productivity and changes with latitude and time of year. The supply of nutrient-rich water from the sea floor and light for photosynthesis is affected by changing water movements and day length, affecting plankton levels. Temperature also affects productivity as it influences the rate of photosynthesis.
The open-ocean surface water can become impoverished, as nutrients are constantly absorbed by phytoplankton and fall with detritus to the sea floor. Nutrient-rich water can be restored to the surface on a large scale by vertical ocean currents in a process called upwelling (see p.60). Near land, coastal upwelling is caused by surface currents, such as the Humboldt Current off South America (see p.58). In the equatorial waters of the Pacific and Atlantic, mid-ocean upwelling occurs when water masses are driven north and south by the trade winds, and cooler, nutrient-rich water rises to take their place. Polar upwelling can happen where winter storms cause intense water movement. When upwelling occurs and there is sufficient sunlight, phytoplankton multiplies rapidly to support a vast number of organisms, creating the most productive ocean waters in the world.
CLEAR, TROPICAL OCEAN
Tropical waters are not mixed seasonally, so few nutrients are returned to the surface, and little plankton growth is possible. Here, a solitary turtle cruises in crystalclear surface waters near Hawaii.
RICH, MURKY TEMPERATE SEA
In coastal and temperate areas, water turbulence circulates nutrient-rich water that supports a variety of algae, such as this kelp forest in the Mediterranean.
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NUTRIENT-RICH WATERS
Where there is upwelling, large numbers of small fish gather to feed on the plankton. They, in turn, attract larger predators like these copper sharks feeding on sardines off the coast of South Africa.
OCEAN LIFE
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SWIMMING AND DRIFTING MOST OF THE OCEAN’S LIVING SPACE IS NOT ON THE SEABED but in the water column and out in the open ocean—areas known as the pelagic zone. Salt water provides support, as well as the nutrients that allow many plants and animals to live in the water column without ever going near the seabed. Some animals live at the interface between ocean and air, or alternate between both environments, because it is more energy-efficient. The water surface, water column, and seabed are all interconnected, and many animals move between these habitats.
PLANKTON The sunlit, surface layers of the ocean are home to a huge array of tiny plants and animals (plankton) that drift with the water currents. Phytoplankton consist of plants or plantlike protists (see p.234) that can photosynthesize and make their own food. Along with fixed seaweeds, phytoplankton forms the basis of ocean food webs. Zooplankton consists of animals, most of which are very small and feed on the phytoplankton. However, jellyfish can grow to a huge size. Many deep-sea forms have strange shapes and soft bodies that are very delicate. Some zooplankton, such as arrow worms, comb jellies, and copepods, live permanently in the plankton, hunting and grazing (holoplankton), while others are simply the larval and dispersal stages of animals, including crabs, worms, and cnidarians (meroplankton) that will spend part or all of their adult lives on the seabed. Many planktonic organisms have elegant spines, long legs, or feathery appendages that help them PLANKTONIC LARVA float. Tropical zooplankton generally have more The eggs of the of these than their temperate or polar equivalents common shore crab because warm water tends to be less dense and hatch into floating, spiny zoea larva. viscous, and so provides less support.
TEMPORARY PLANKTON
Most temporary zooplankton are the larvae of animals that, as adults, live on the seabed. The common jellyfish, however, has a planktonic adult stage (shown above), and a fixed, asexual, juvenile stage (right).
NEKTON Fish and most other free-living marine animals can all swim, even if only for short distances, over the seabed. However, some animals spend their whole lives swimming in the open ocean and are collectively called nekton. This group includes many fish and all whales, dolphins, and other marine mammals, turtles, sea snakes, and cephalopods. There are also some representatives from other groups such as swimming crabs and shrimp. Most nektonic animals are TYPICAL NEKTON FEATURE Most nektonic animals, including streamlined, and there is a remarkable similarity in shape between some dolphins dusky dolphins, are vertebrates, (having either bones or cartilage). and open-ocean nektonic fish such as tuna.
OCEAN LIFE
THE OCEANAIR INTERFACE Some animals live at the interface between air and water, either floating at the surface or alternating between the two environments. Oceanic birds such as albatrosses, petrels, gannets, and tropic birds spend their whole lives out at sea. They eat, sleep, preen, and even mate on the ocean surface. Large rafts of such seabirds are particularly vulnerable to oil spillages. Other diving seabirds, such as terns and puffins, alternate between hunting at sea and resting on land. Just as these birds plunge down into the water to catch fish, so some sharks lunge out of the water to catch birds and turtles. Flying fish leap into the air to escape their predators. Some planktonic animals live permanently at the water surface with part of their body projecting into the air. The by-the-wind sailor is a small, colonial cnidarian that is supported by a gas-filled float and transported by wind blowing against its vertical sail. Drifting with it on a DRIFTING AT THE INTERFACE raft of mucous bubbles is the violet sea snail, which The large gas-filled float of the also feeds on it. There are even surface-living Portuguese man-of-war supports the insects, of the genus Halobates, that drift the oceans. whole colony at the water surface.
FLYING AND DIVING
The brown pelican is one of several species that dive or dip down from the air into the water to catch fish. It uses its capacious beak as a scoop.
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FLOATING COMMUNITY
Ocean sunfish often drift at the ocean surface and will investigate any floating objects for potential food, such as jellyfish and planktonic crustaceans.
DRIFTING HOMES
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FISH-ATTRACTING DEVICE
Even simple FADs, such as this floating buoy in Hawaii, will attract fish. Juvenile jacks and endemic Hawaiian damselfish can be seen sheltering under this one.
OCEAN LIFE
Many pelagic fish species are attracted to floating objects that provide shelter from predators, currents, and even sunlight. Floating logs and seaweed also provide a meeting point. Fishermen have exploited this tendency by using fish-attracting devices (FADs, see panel, right) to concentrate fish in one area. These vary from simple rafts with hanging coconut palm leaves to complex technological devices. Mini-ecosystems often develop on and around large drifting logs. Seaweeds and goose barnacles settle, providing shelter and food for crabs, worms, and fish. Shipworms bore into the wood, and their tunnels provide further refuge. Occasionally reptiles, insects, and plant seeds SARGASSO HAVEN survive and drift on logs, Floating Sargassum seaweed and may eventually be provides a safe haven for the washed ashore to colonize sargassumfish. More than new places, including new 50 animal species have been recorded in this habitat. volcanic islands.
HUMAN IMPACT
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BOTTOMLIVING ANIMALS LIVING ON THE OCEAN FLOOR or within its sand and mud, either moving over it or firmly attached, are called benthic animals. On land, plants provide a structural habitat within which animals live. In the ocean, this is rarely the case, except in shallow, sunlit areas dominated by kelp, seaweeds, or seagrasses. Instead, wherever areas of hard sea bed provide a stable foundation, a growth of benthic animals develops, fixed to the sea bed and often resembling plants. A sea bed of shifting sediments is no place for fixed animals. Here, a community of burrowers develops instead. BENEATH THE SEAWEED
Below the seaweed-dominated zone around northern European coasts, on sea beds too deep and dark for photosynthesis, dead man’s fingers, sponges, and tube worms typically grow attached to subtidal rocks.
FIXED ANIMALS Many benthic animals such as sponges, sea squirts, corals, and hydroids spend their entire adult lives fixed to the sea bed, unable to move around. On land, animals must move around in search of food, whether they are grazers, predators, or scavengers. In the ocean, water currents carry an abundant supply of food in the form of plankton and floating dead organic matter. Fixed animals can take advantage of this by simply catching, trapping, or filtering their food directly from the water, without having to move from place to place. When it is time to reproduce, they simply shed eggs and sperm into the water, where the eggs are fertilized and grow into planktonic larvae. Sometimes, they retain their larvae or eggs, and release them REEF-FORMING TUBE WORM only when the young are well developed. In some Scottish sea lochs, Water currents distribute the offspring to the chalky cases of tube new areas, where they can settle and grow. worms form substantial reefs.
MOBILE ANIMALS
OCEAN LIFE
Dense growths of seaweeds or fixed animals provide shelter and food for many mobile animals. Grazers, such as sea urchins, crawl through the undergrowth, eating both seaweeds and fixed animals. Meanwhile, crabs, lobsters, and starfish scramble and swim around, hunting and scavenging for food. Sea slugs are specialist predators, each species feeding on one, or a few, types of bryozoans, hydroids, or sponges. Sea slugs therefore live in close association with their prey and rarely stray far. Kelp holdfasts provide a safe haven for small, mobile animals such as worms.
FISH IN DISGUISE
Scorpionfish live on the seabed among the seaweeds and fixed animals. Their intricate skin-flaps blend in with this habitat.
SEABED IN THE SUN
Seaweeds anchor in the tidal zone of rocky shores and on rocky reefs, such as this one in the Canary Islands. On sunlit, temperate sea beds, it is seaweeds that provide the community structure.
bottom-living
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BURROWING AND BORING Much of the seafloor is covered in soft sediments, such as sand and mud. Living on the surface of the sediment is both difficult and dangerous, and most animals burrow below or build tubes in which to live and hide. Bivalves and segmented worms cope especially well in this habitat, and many different species can be found in sediments all over the world. Safe under the sediment surface, a bivalve draws in oxygen-rich water and plankton through one of its two long siphons, expelling waste through the other. It never has to come out to feed or breathe. Piddocks and shipworms bore into rocks and wood, then use their siphons in a similar way. They are not completely safe here—predatory moon snails dig through the sediment and bore into bivalve shells, eating the contents. Ragworms are also active predators, hunting through the sediment for other worms and crustaceans. Some worms build flexible tubes from sand grains, their own secretions, or both. The tubes stick out of the sand, and they feed by extending feathery or sticky tentacles from the tube to catch plankton. If danger threatens, they can withdraw rapidly. A similar strategy is adopted by tube anemones and sea pens.
REPLACING SIPHONS
BORING INTO ROCK
The siphon tops of buried bivalve mollusks are sometimes nipped off by flatfish but can regrow.
The boring sponge uses chemicals to dissolve tunnels in calcareous shells and rocks, creating a living space for itself.
FIXED TO THE BOTTOM
Christmas-tree worms live attached to the bottom in hard tubes that they cement into coral reefs. They feed by filtering plankton from the water, using their beautiful double spiral of tentacles.
SYMBIOSIS Bottom-living is a challenge for marine organisms. A safe crevice on a coral reef, for instance, is valuable, but fiercely fought over. The solution to finding a home is often to enter an intimate relationship with a different organism—a situation called symbiosis. When only one partner benefits, the relationship is called commensal, and often involves one animal providing a home for the other. MUTUAL RELATIONSHIP Small pea crabs live inside mussels, The Banded Coral Shrimp earns its place gaining shelter and food, while the in the moray eel’s well-defended crevice mussel merely tolerates their by cleaning the teeth of its host. presence. Symbiosis in which both partners benefit is called mutualism. Many tropical gobies live in such relationships with blind or nearly-blind shrimp. The shrimp digs and maintains a sandy burrow that accommodates both, while its sharp-eyed partner goby acts as a lookout. Some anemones adhere to the shells of hermit crabs, gaining from the crab’s mobility and access to its food scraps. The crab is protected, in return, by the anemone’s stinging tentacles. The third type of symbiosis is parasitism, in which one partner, the host, is harmed. The crustacean Sacculina spreads funguslike strands through its host crab’s body to extract nutrients, weakening or killing the crab.
Large reef anemones often provide a haven for clownfish and tiny cleaner shrimp. The anemone benefits from the housekeeping activities of its guests.
OCEAN LIFE
A HOME IN EXCHANGE FOR CLEANING
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LIVING DOWN DEEP THE DEEP-SEA ENVIRONMENT APPEARS INHOSPITABLE—cold, dark, and with little food. However, it is remarkably stable: temperatures remain between 35 and 39ºF (2 and 4ºC) year-round, salinity is constant, and the perpetual darkness is overcome by novel communication methods (see pp.228–29). Although deep-sea pressures are immense, most marine animals are unaffected, since they have no air spaces, while animals living below about 5,000 ft (1,500 m) show subtle adaptations. Species diversity of large animals decreases with depth, but there is a huge diversity of small organisms living within deep-sea sediments.
OCEAN LIFE
PRESSURE PROBLEMS
DEEP-SEA ADAPTATIONS
Anglerfish have a lightweight skeleton and muscles for neutral buoyancy. This specimen’s muscles have been “cleared” to show the bone, which is stained red.
Deep-ocean animals experience huge pressures, but problems arise only in gasfilled organs such as the lungs of diving mammals and the swim bladders of fish. Sperm whales, Weddell seals, and elephant seals all dive to depths where their lungs are compressed, but their flexible rib cages allow this. While underwater, they use oxygen stored in blood and muscles. Deep-sea fish can cover a large vertical range because pressure changes at depth are proportionately less, per foot, than near the surface, so the pressure or size of their swim bladders does not change radically. In oceanic trenches, the pressure is so great that it affects the operation of biological molecules, such as proteins. Pressure-loving bacteria in SPERM WHALE this habitat have specialized Sperm whales can dive to at proteins—they cannot least 3,300 ft (1,000 m), where grow or reproduce when the pressure is 100 times brought to the surface. greater than at the surface.
living down deep
FINDING FOOD
mouth surrounded by modified tube feet
The major problem of deep-sea living is finding enough food. With the exception of communities based around hydrothermal vents and cold seeps (see pp.188–89), animals living in the deep ocean and on the deep-ocean floor are ultimately reliant on food production in the sunlit layer, thousands of feet above. In the depths, it is too dark for plant plankton to live and to provide food. Sometimes, large mammal or fish carcasses reach the sea bed, but most food arrives as tiny food fragments, slowly sinking from above. Much is eaten before it reaches the sea floor, but much is also added in the form of skins, shed from mid-water crustaceans and salps. Bacteria grow on such material, helping it to clump together and so fall more rapidly.
SEABED CONSUMER
The fangtooth lives at midwater depths of about 1,600–6,500 ft (500–2,000 m). Food is scarce, so its large mouth and sharp teeth help it to catch all available prey.
DISCOVERY
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tube foot, used to move across seafloor
MIDWATER FEEDER
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Sea cucumbers vacuum up organic remains from the sea floor. At high latitudes, more food rains down in spring, following surface phytoplankton blooms; these rains may trigger sea cucumbers to reproduce.
SCAVENGING GIANTS Many deep-sea animals are smaller than their relatives in shallow water. This is an evolutionary response to the difficulties of finding food in the deep ocean. However, some scavengers survive by growing much larger than their shallow-water counterparts. For example, amphipod and isopod crustaceans that measure only about ½ in (1 cm) long are common in shallow water, where they scavenge on rotting seaweed and other debris. Carrion in the deep sea is sparse, but it comes in big, tough lumps such as whale carcasses. Some deep-sea amphipods grow to a length of 4–6 in (10–15 cm), more than ten times larger than shallow-water species, and so are able to tackle such a bonanza. In the low temperature of the deep ocean, these animals move and grow slowly and reproduce infrequently, but live much longer than their shallow-water counterparts. Sea urchins, hydroids, seapens, and other animals also have giant deep-sea forms. Similar giants are found in cold Antarctic waters.
A WINDOW ON DEEP-SEA LIFE
Deep Rover is a two-person submersible capable of diving to 3,300 ft (1,000 m), launched from a semi-submersible platform. The occupants can see all the way around through the acrylic hull.
STAYING ALOFT Huge areas of the deep-sea floor are covered in soft sediments many yards thick, called oozes (see p.181). Seabed animals need ways of staying above these sediments so that they can feed and breathe effectively. Many sedentary filter-feeding animals, such as sea lilies, sea pens, and some sponges, have long stalks, enabling them to keep their feeding structures above the sediment. Some sea cucumbers have developed stiltlike tube feet that help them walk over the sediment surface, instead of having to plow through it. Similarly, the tripodfish props itself up on its fin tips. One species of sea cucumber, Paelopatides grisea, has an unusually flattened shape that allows it to lift itself off the sea bed with slow undulations of its body. SEA LILIES ANCHORED IN THE OOZE
To catch food, sea lilies reach up into the current on stalks up to 60cm (2ft) high. The stalk extends deep into the sediment to provide an anchor.
DEEP-SEA GIANT
The widespread deep-sea scavenger amphipod Eurythenes grows to over 3 in (8 cm).
OCEAN LIFE
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BIOLUMINESCENCE produced by living organisms. On land, only a few nocturnal animals, such as fireflies, produce light, but in the ocean, thousands of species do so. Deep-water fish and squid use bioluminescence extensively, but there are many other light producers, such as species of bacteria, dinoflagellates, sea pens, jellyfish, mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms. Evidence suggests that marine organisms use bioluminescence for defense (as camouflage or distraction), for finding and luring prey, and for recognizing and signaling to potential mates.
BIOLUMINESCENCE IS A COLD LIGHT
LIGHT PRODUCTION
pigment cup
Many bioluminescent marine organisms use their light in communication. This bristlemouth fish can signal to its own kind with its specific photophore pattern.
light source lens
rays Bioluminescence is produced by a chemical into reaction in special cells known as photocytes, focused beam and carried away usually contained within light organs called from source photophores. A light-producing compound called luciferin is oxidized with the help of an LENS enzyme called luciferase, releasing energy in the form of a cold light. Most bioluminescent light is pigment light cup blue-green, but some animals can produce green, source yellow, or, more rarely, red light. A range of light-producing structures is found in different animals. The hydroid Obelia has single photocytes scattered in its tissues, while certain fish and squid have complex photophores with lenses and light filters. Some animals, including flashlight and eyelight pipe LIGHT PIPE fish, some anglerfish, ponyfish, and some squid, adopt a different strategy. pigment light TYPES They culture symbiotic, PHOTOPHORE cup source Photophores often feature a bioluminescent bacteria pigment cup and a lens that directs in special organs. The the light into a parallel beam. With a light pipe, light can be bacteria produce their filter allows light and are, in return, channeled from the photophore, deep-red which might be buried in the only deeppigment fed nutrients by their red light animal’s body. Color filters in filter host and given a safe to pass front of the light source fine-tune COLOR FILTER place in which to live. the color of the emitted light.
HUNTING WITH A SPOTLIGHT
The dragonfish produces a beam of red light, from a photophore beneath its eye, to spotlight its prey. Red light is invisible to most deep-sea animals.
LIGHT DISGUISE
body covered with tiny, flashing photophores
Animals using bioluminescence to attract prey, or to signal to each other, risk alerting their own predators to their presence. However, lights can also be used for camouflage. Hatchetfish live at depths where some surface light is still dimly visible. To keep their silhouette from being seen from below, they manipulate the light they emit from photophores along their belly, to mimic the intensity and direction of the light coming from above. Bioluminescence is also used to MANIPULATING LIGHT confuse potential predators. Flashlight fish The silvery, vertical flanks of turn their cheek lights on and off. Some hatchetfish reflect downwelling squid, shrimp, and worms eject luminous light, and their photophores shine secretions or break off luminous body parts downward, camouflaging their that act as decoys, while they escape. silhouette from below.
OCEAN LIFE
USING LIGHT TO COMMUNICATE
LUMINOUS SMOKESCREEN
organs producing downward-directed beams of light
A firefly squid presents a predator with a myriad of confusing pinprick lights emitted from its body. It can also secrete a cloud of luminous particles into the water to act as a smokescreen, allowing it to escape.
squid’s ink is bioluminescent
bioluminescence
bioluminescent organ produces light and directs it downward; the light merges with light downwelling from the sky and conceals the animal from predators below
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light organs form a distinctive pattern recognized by other bristlemouths
PREDATORS In the unlit regions of the deep ocean, many hunters try to attract prey, rather than go in search of it. After all, hunting light-producing bacteria cause by sight and chasing prey is difficult lure to glow where the only available light is from bioluminescence. An obvious way of attracting prey is to use a luminous lure, and anglerfish are especially good at this. Anglerfish in the genus Linophryne have a head lure, like a fishing rod, lit by luminous bacteria, and a chin barbel with tiny photophores that produce their own light. Midwater fish often have thin skeletons and weak muscles to improve their buoyancy, so luring prey is an energy-efficient way for them to hunt. Stauroteuthis syrtensis, an unusual deep-sea octopus with glowing suckers, sets a deadly trap. Its eight tentacles are connected into a web, and its modified suckers, which have lost the ability to grasp, GLOWING JELLYFISH LUMINOUS LURE The mauve stinger glows are bioluminescent. Although this species has never Fish are attracted to the luminous lure of with bioluminescence when been seen hunting, its prey (which are primarily deep-sea anglerfish and are quickly snapped it is disturbed by waves, and copepods) is probably lured toward the raised, up. Most anglerfish are brown or black so can also produce a luminous light-emitting arms, and then enfolded and eaten. that they do not light themselves up. mucus if it is touched.
PHOSPHORESCENCE
Dinoflagellates are tiny, single-celled organisms that emit bright flashes of light when disturbed. In large numbers, they produce “phosphorescent” seas.
OCEAN LIFE
On a still, warm night, especially in the tropics, moving boats leave a glittering trail of light in their wake and divers can create swirling pinpricks of light by simply moving around. This phenomenon is caused by bioluminescent plankton, mostly dinoflagellates. Their light is often informally called phophorescence, because it is emitted when they are disturbed, but decays after a few seconds. Biological phosphorescence is thought to be an antipredation device. When dinoflagellates are attacked by planktonic copepods, they flash. This alerts nearby shrimp and fish to the copepods’ presence, and the copepods themselves may then become prey. Some dinoflagellates, such as Gonyaulax polyedra, only produce light at night, so they do not waste energy on light production when it cannot be seen. Deep-sea jellyfish may use a similar antipredator strategy. The jellyfish light up only when disturbed by vibrations, which indicate an approaching predator. Often, a series of erratic flashes travels over the entire body surface. Such lights may serve to distract the predator.
BIOLUMINESCENT PLANKTON
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THE HISTORY OF OCEAN LIFE for over 3.5 billion years. The great diversity of today’s marine life represents only a minute proportion of all species that have ever lived. Evidence of early life is hard to find, but it is seen in a few ancient sedimentary rocks. The fossil record has many gaps, but it is the only record of what past life looked like. Fortunately, many marine organisms have shells, carapaces, or other hard body parts, such as bones and teeth. They are more likely to be preserved than entirely soft-bodied creatures, although in exceptional circumstances these have also been fossilized. Using fossils, and information from the sediments in which they are preserved, scientists can reconstruct the history of marine life. LIFE HAS BEEN PRESENT IN THE OCEANS
3,8002,200 MILLION YEARS AGO THE ORIGIN OF LIFE
EARLY MICROFOSSILS
This micrograph of a section of chert (a form of silica) from the Gunflint Formation, Canada, includes 2-billion-year-old microfossil remains. These microfossils contain the oldest and best-preserved fossil cells known.
When Earth formed, it was totally unsuitable for life. The atmosphere changed, however, and the oceans formed and cooled (see pp.44–45), so that by 3.8 billion years ago, conditions allowed biochemical reactions to take place. It is thought that simple, water-soluble organic compounds called amino acids accumulated in the water, eventually forming chains and creating proteins. These combined with other organic compounds, including self-replicating DNA, to form the first living cells. Earth’s atmosphere was further developed by mats of algae and cyanobacteria called stromatolites, whose fossil record stretches from over 3.5 billion years ago to the present day. Stromatolites could perform photosynthesis, and their growth eventually flooded the atmosphere with oxygen. Cyanobacteria are single-celled organisms with DNA but no nucleus or complex cell organelles. It was not until 2.2 billion years ago that cells with nuclei and complex organelles (eukaryote cells) appeared.
620542 MYA PRECAMBRIAN LIFE Ancient life, though soft-bodied, fossilizes under certain conditions, offering rare glimpses of early multicellular life. About 620 million years ago, a community of soft-bodied animals known as the Ediacaran fauna left their body impressions and trackways in a shallow sea bed. The sea bed now forms the sandstone of the Ediacaran Hills in Australia, where the fauna was discovered in the 1940s. The ancient sea was inhabited by strange, multicellular animals. Some resembled worms and jellyfish, but others were thin, flat, and unfamiliar, making it difficult to know if they are related to existing animals or a separate, extinct, evolutionary line. These animals are the only link between the single-celled organisms that preceded them and the rapid diversification of life that followed. Ediacaran fauna are also found in Namibia, Sweden, Eastern Europe, Canada, and the UK.
OCEAN LIFE
EDIACARAN FOSSILS
These are typical examples of Ediacaran fossils preserved as impressions in rock. Mawsonite (left) is believed to be a complex animal burrow; Spriggina (below) may be an arthropod, or a new life-form.
PEOPLE
A.I. OPARIN In 1924, Russian biochemist Aleksandr Oparin (1894–1980) theorized that life originated in the oceans. He suggested that simple substances in ancient seas harnessed sunlight to generate organic compounds found in cells. These compounds eventually evolved into a living cell.
the history of ocean life
227
550530 MYA CAMBRIAN EXPLOSION
FIRST REEFS
The Cambrian reefs were built by extinct sponges called archaeocyathids. They resembled tube sponges (above), having a similar shape and a calcareous skeleton.
Over 20 million years around the start of the Cambrian period, many life-forms made a sudden appearance. Indeed, most of today’s major animal groups (phyla) abruptly appear in the fossil record. The Cambrian Explosion of evolution may have been caused by the creation of new ecological niches as the coastline increased, due to the breakup of the Rodinia supercontinent. Further niches arose as a rise in sea level produced large expanses of warm, shallow water. The Cambrian seas were dominated by arthropods, chiefly trilobites, but there were also foraminiferans, sponges, corals, bivalves, and brachiopods. All readily fossilize, as they each have some sort of mineralized “skeleton.” ARTHROPOD TRAILBLAZERS
Trilobites evolved a multitude of different body forms and remained a ubiquitous arthropod group for the next 100 million years. They became extinct during the Permian period.
BRACHIOPODS
Brachiopods may resemble bivalve mollusks, but they are unrelated life-forms and were among the first animals to appear in the Cambrian period. Over 3,000 genera have been described. Only 300 species survive today.
418354 MYA THE AGE OF FISH LIVING MARINE STROMATOLITES
Built by Earth’s oldest type of organism, stromatolites are now found in only a few places, such as here, in the hypersaline water of Hamelin Pool, Australia.
The earliest vertebrate fossils known are jawless fish that lived some 468 million years ago. Jawed fish appeared in the Silurian period, following the development of massive coral and sponge reefs that provided them with a multitude of habitats in which to diversify. The now-extinct acanthodians, with their prominent spines on the leading edges of their fins, were among the earliest of these. Having hinged jaws allowed fish to feed more efficiently, and paired fins gave them the speed and maneuverability to hunt. The following Devonian period (418–354 million years ago) saw an evolutionary radiation that could be called the “Age of Fish.”Armored fish called placoderms dominated Devonian seas, some reaching lengths of 20 ft (6 m). Ray-finned fish, sharks, and lobe-finned fish also appeared at this time and have survived to the present day, although marine lobe-finned fish are known only from the coelacanth. Lobe-finned fish are important in the fossil record because one group gave rise to early tetrapods (limbed vertebrates).
EVOLUTIONARY INSIGHT EARLY JAWLESS FISH
Jawless fish first evolved in the ocean, later spreading into brackish and freshwater habitats. The bony head shield and dorsally situated eyes of this Cephalaspis suggest it is a bottom-dweller.
This lobe-finned fish, Tiktaalik roseae, has gills and scales like a fish, but has tetrapod-like limbs and joints. This “missing link” helps to reveal how animals moved from the oceans onto land.
Mimia, a small, ray-finned fish
Cladoselachii, one of the few sharks in the seas at this time
The Devonian reef fauna (right) from Gogo, Australia, is typical of the time. It is dominated by a wide variety of armored placoderms, but ray- and lobe-finned fish, and a shark, have also been found there.
Rolfosteus, a long-snouted placoderm with crushing toothplates
Bothriolepis, a bottom-dwelling placoderm
phyllocarid, a relatively common shrimplike crustacean
Nautiloid, a primitive marine shelled cephalopod
rugose coral; common in Devonian seas, now extinct tabulate coral, now extinct
OCEAN LIFE
DEVONIAN COMMUNITY
Eastmanosteus, a large placoderm and active predator
228
introduction to ocean life
25265 MYA GIANT MARINE REPTILES
PEOPLE
During Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous times, evolution of reptiles, similar to that of the dinosaurs on land, occurred in the oceans. Between 252 and 227 million years ago, three groups appeared—turtlelike placodonts, lizardlike nothosaurs, and dolphinlike ichthyosaurs. Of these, only ichthyosaurs survived until the Jurassic. The Jurassic oceans teemed with life. Modern fish groups were well represented, as were ammonites, mollusks, squid, and modern corals. A variety of ichthyosaurs evolved, some giant forms reaching 30 ft (9 m) in length, but they soon died out and were replaced by modern sharks. The gap left by the extinction of the placodonts and nothosaurs was filled by long-necked plesiosaurs. Those with a short body and tail and a small head lived in shallow water, while larger forms, called pliosaurs, probably lived in deep water. It is also likely that some of the flying reptiles, called pterosaurs, lived on coastal cliffs and survived by eating fish caught at the water’s surface. During the Cretaceous Period, reptiles remained the largest marine carnivores, (plesiosaurs now coexisting with mosasaurs, distant relatives of monitor lizards,) but none survived the mass extinction that occurred 65 million years ago.
Lyme Regis in Dorset, UK, is famous for its Jurassic fossils, and is where Mary Anning (1799-1847) found and collected her nowfamous ichthyosaur and plesiosaur skeletons. She was one of the first professional fossil collectors.
MARY ANNING
FOSSILIZED ICHTHYOSAUR
The dolphinlike features of this ichthyosaur are evident from its fossilized remains. The powerful tail was half-moon-shaped, but here only the down-turned backbone is preserved.
dorsal vertebrae with attachment points for long ribs rib
long neck comprising 30 vertebrae
PLESIOSAUR
Cryptoclidus eurymerus is a mid-Jurassic plesiosaur. It has a small head, long neck, and short tail, which is typical of shallowwater forms. Its sharp teeth indicate that it ate small fish or shrimplike crustaceans. platelike, flattened collarbone lends support on land
pointed, interlocking teeth trap prey
paddlelike hind flipper large bones of pelvic girdle
TIMELINE OF EARTH HISTORY 4,000 MYA
Million 4,100 MYA years ago CRYPTOZOIC EON 4,500–542 MYA
first organic molecules
3,500 MYA
3,000 MYA
first stromatolites
OCEAN LIFE
5014 MYA RETURN TO WATER
ANCIENT WHALE SKELETON
This skeleton has been exposed in a desert in Saccao, Peru. Whales evolved over the last 50 million years, so this area must have been an ancient sea at some point in this period. SKULL WITH A BLOWHOLE
The nostrils of Prosqualodon davidi are positioned on top of the head, forming a blowhole. This feature proves that this fossil skull is from a primitive whale.
Following the mass extinction that saw the demise of marine reptiles, some mammals that had evolved on land began returning to the water. Around 50 million years ago, the oceans started to resemble modern oceans in terms of their geographical positions and fauna. The ancestors of whales, however, were unlike their modern counterparts. The earliest whale, Pakicetus, was probably a close relative of the hoofed mammals (ungulates), but it is known only from its skull. Ambulocetus, which means “walking whale,” is another early form. It had few adaptations for living in water and probably still spent much time on land. The productivity of the oceans increased, whales diversified, and other marine mammals appeared. Whales similar to today’s toothed whales appeared first, and a few million years later, baleen whales evolved. By 24 million years ago, baleen whales had reached today’s giant sizes, suggesting that plankton was present in vast numbers for them to feed on. Only 14 million years ago, pinnipeds and sirenians (dugongs and manatees) evolved. It is thought that pinnipeds arose from a family of carnivores not unlike otters. Their present-day forms are seals, sea lions, and walruses.
2,500 MYA first microfossils
2,200 MYA
first eukaryotes and multicellular algae
HUMAN IMPACT
,)&%/.4(%-/6% (UMANSHAVELONGHADAPROFOUND EFFECTONTHEOCEANSTHROUGH POLLUTION OVERFISHING ANDLINKING OCEANSWITHCANALS0EOPLEHAVE ALSOTRANSPORTEDMARINEORGANISMS ALLOVERTHEWORLD INANDONTHEIR SHIPS WITHOUTKNOWINGWHAT LONG TERMIMPACTTHISWILLHAVE
229 GRAY REEF SHARK
TODAY: LIFE IN MODERN OCEANS
Like its close relative the Caribbean reef shark (below), this shark lives in warm, shallow waters, near coral atolls and in adjacent lagoons. It is found in the Indian and Pacific oceans, but it is cut off from the Atlantic.
CARIBBEAN REEF SHARK
PA L 65 AE –2 OG 3.3 EN M E YA NE 23 OGE .3– N E QU 1.8 1.8 ATE MYA –P RN RE AR SE Y NT
JU 19 RAS 9.5 S –1 IC 42 M
CR 14 ETA 2– CE 65 O M US YA
YA
Like the gray reef shark (above), this species lives in shallow water near coral reefs. Its range is isolated from the Indo-Pacific by the deep, cold ocean around South Africa, so it is restricted to warm parts of the Atlantic, from the Caribbean to Uruguay.
M I 35 SSI 4– SS 32 IP 3 M PI A YA N PE NN 32 S 3– Y 29 LV 0 M AN YA IAN PE R 29 MI 0– AN 25 2M YA TR I 25 ASS 2– IC 19 9.5 M YA
YA DE V 41 ON 8– IA 35 N 4M YA
SI L 44 UR 3– IA 41 N 8M
OR 49 DOV 0– IC 44 IA 3M N YA
CA 54 MB 2– RIA 49 N 0M YA
ED I 63 AC 5– AR 54 AN 2M YA
We know much more about life in today’s oceans because, as well having entire organisms to study, we can also observe life cycles, locomotion, and behavior. Each of the five oceans supports a wide variety of life. Some species are very specialized and are restricted to a small area, while others are migratory or generalists and have a wider distribution. Sometimes, closely related species live in the same habitat in different oceans, separated by land or other physical barriers (see right). By studying living organisms and the characteristics of the water they live in, scientists can also better understand ancient ocean environments and organisms. The deep ocean is still poorly known, but it contains an ecosystem that could be crucial to our understanding of life—black smokers (see p.188). Isolated from sunlight and from the surrounding water by a steep thermal gradient, it is possible that this is the type of environment in which life first evolved 3.5 billion years ago.
earliest sharks appear fourth mass extinction Cambrian Explosion: rapid evolution of body forms
635
600
550
first lobe-finned fish appear
first armored fish appear
450
500
400
earliest penguins
third mass extinction
350
300
first turtles appear
250
200
150
100
second mass extinction plactodonts (earliest marine reptiles) appear
earliest jawless fish, representing the first vertebrates, appear
2,000 MYA
1,500 MYA
plesiosaurs replace placodonts ichthyosaurs appear
1,000 MYA
700 MYA
mosasaurs replace ichthyosaurs
635 MYA PHANEROZOIC EON 542 MYA–PRESENT
first fossil evidence of mineralized skeletons
MASS EXTINCTIONS
This ammonite species is one of the few to survive the lateTriassic mass extinction event.
fifth mass extinction kills last ammonites
PRESENT DAY
beginning of the Ediacaran period, which soon features the first multicellular life
VOLCANIC ARMAGEDDON
Volcanic activity in the western Ghats of India is now thought to have been a factor in the most recent mass extinction. The eruptions would have caused destruction and climate change on a global scale.
OCEAN LIFE
The history of life is punctuated by five mass extinctions—catastrophic events in which many life forms died out. The first occurred 443 million years ago, when prominent marine invertebrates disappeared from the fossil record. About 368 million years ago, global cooling and an oxygen shortage in shallow seas caused about 21 percent of marine families to disappear, including corals, brachiopods, bivalves, fishes, and ancient sponges. At the end of the Permian Period, 252 million years ago, the cooling and shrinking of oceans killed over half of all marine life. Another mass-extinction event at the end of the Triassic Period, 199.5 million years ago, caused major losses of cephalopods, especially the ammonites. The fifth extinction, 65 million years ago, caused the demise of the dinosaurs; in the oceans, it caused the giant marine reptiles to disappear. The next mass extinction is likely to be a result of human activity. AMMONITE FOSSIL
50 whales diversify
first mass extinction
Ediacaran fossils show early multicellular life
whales evolve from terrestrial mammals
LIFE ON EARTH was once thought to fall into
five great kingdoms—the animals, plants, and fungi, and the two microscopic kingdoms, the protists and the bacteria. Scientists are now looking at life ever more closely, and each discovery expands our perspective on life’s vast variety. Many experts now consider that the familiar life-forms, plants and animals, represent just two of 30 or more kingdoms. The oceans are the ancestral home of life and are still home to all major groups of animals. Although plants are far more diverse on land, their place is taken in the oceans by a range of seaweeds and microorganisms. The following section showcases the entire range of ocean life. It is organized into kingdoms and further divided into the smaller units used by scientists to order and understand nature.
K I NG D OM S OF OC E A N L I F E SUCCESS IN WATER
This violet-spotted reef lobster is a flamboyant example of one of the marine success stories of the animal kingdom—the varied and abundant crustaceans. The crustaceans as a group include crabs, crayfish, shrimp, and some of the most common members of the zooplankton.
232
bacteria and archaea
BACTERIA AND ARCHAEA
PEOPLE
are the bacteria and their relatives, the archaea. Bacteria occupy virtually Archaea all oceanic habitats, whereas most archaea are confined KINGDOMS 13 to extreme environments, such as deep-sea vents. Bacteria SPECIES many millions and archaea play vital roles in the recycling of matter. Many are decomposers of dead organisms on the ocean floor. Others are remarkable in being able to obtain their energy from minerals in the complete absence of light.
"ORNIN.EW9ORKIN #ARL7OESEISTHEMICROBIOLOGIST WHOISRESPONSIBLEFORTHECURRENT DIVISIONOFLIVINGORGANISMSINTO THREEDOMAINS !RCHAEA "ACTERIA AND%UCARYA ONTHEBASISOF HISRESEARCHINTOTHE2.!A CHEMICALRELATEDTO$.! CALLED RIBONUCLEICACID FOUNDIN RIBOSOMES!LTHOUGH7OESEPUT FORWARDHISNEWCLASSIFICATIONIN ITWASNOTUNTILTHES THATHISHYPOTHESISWASACCEPTED
OCEAN LIFE
DOMAINS Bacteria
THE SMALLEST ORGANISMS ON EARTH
ANATOMY
HABITATS
Bacteria and archaea are singlecelled organisms that are far smaller than any other, even protists. Most have a cell wall, which, in bacteria, is made from a substance called peptidoglycan. None has a nucleus or any of the other cell structures of more complex organisms (eukaryotes). Some bacteria and archaea can move by rotating threads called flagella; others have no means of propulsion. Scientists separated the Archaea and Bacteria groups on the basis THRIVING IN THE RIGHT CONDITIONS of chemical differences in their cell The bacterium Nitrosomonas forms colonies make-up. All living cells contain wherever there is enough ammonia and oxygen in the water. tiny granules (ribosomes), which help to make proteins, but those in archaea are differently shaped to those in bacteria. The oily substances that make up their cell membranes are also different. Additionally, archaea have special molecules associated with their DNA that protect them in the harsh environments in which they live. Scientists now think that their chemical HEAT-LOVING ARCHAEA differences are sufficiently important to rank Most archaea can adapt Archaea as a distinct evolutionary branch of to extreme conditions. This life. Initially considered to be primitive, the heat-loving example, GRI, archaea are now thought to be closer to the was ejected from the sea floor in an undersea eruption. ancestors of eukaryotes than are the bacteria.
Bacteria are found throughout the ocean environment, because nearly all habitats provide them with the materials necessary to obtain energy. Most bacteria obtain energy by breaking down organic matter. Much of this matter accumulates on the ocean floor and provides excellent conditions for the decomposer bacteria. However, bacteria are also found in smaller numbers in the water column, feeding on suspended matter. A few kinds of bacteria, such as cyanobacteria, can photosynthesize and so live nearer to the surface, in brightly lit waters. Some form colonies and build huge structures, called stromatolites, near the shore. Most archaea can live in extreme and harsh conditions, such as high temperatures, highly acidic water, high salinity, or low oxygen levels. For example, archaea live around deep-sea vents and obtain their energy from chemical reactions of methane and sulphide compounds ejected by the vents. Others survive in the very high concentrations of salt on some sea shores.
HYPER-SALINE CONDITIONS
The hyper-saline water of Hamelin Pool, west Australia, is ideal for stromatolites. The rocks are formed by the cyanobacteria cementing sediment particles together.
#!2,7/%3%
LIVING ON THE SEA BED
Bacterial mats form on the sea bed where oxygen supply is low. This mat of Beggiatoa sp. is at the mouth of the Mississippi, USA.
bacteria and archaea DOMAIN BACTERIA
DOMAIN BACTERIA
Oscillatoria willei SIZE
DISTRIBUTION
DOMAIN BACTERIA
Trichodesmium erythraeum 1–10 mm per colony
DISTRIBUTION
SIZE
Tropical waters
Once known as blue-green algae, cyanobacteria are bacteria that are able to use photosynthesis to make foods in a similar way to plants. Oscillatoria willei and other related cyanobacteria occur in rows of similarly sized cells that form filaments called trichomes. Many trichomes are enveloped in a firm casing, but in Oscillatoria the casing is thin or may be absent altogether, which allows the filaments to glide quickly forward, backward, or even rotate. Some species of Oscillatoria can fix nitrogen but, unlike Trichodesmium (below), they may not have cells specialized for the purpose.
SIZE
Calothrix crustacea
Filament length 0.13 mm
Tropical and subtropical seas
worldwide
Filament length 0.15 mm
DISTRIBUTION
Fragments of filaments, called hormogonia, which consist of dozens of cells, sometimes break off and glide away to establish new colonies. These bacteria may cause skin irritations in humans who come in contact with them in tropical waters.
Worldwide
Forming single filaments or small bundles, bacteria of the genus Calothrix are widespread in oceans everywhere. Unlike those of Oscillatoria and Trichodesmium (left), the filaments of Calothrix crustacea have a broad base and a pointed tip that ends in a transparent hair. The filament has a firm or jellylike coating, which is often made up of concentric layers that may be colorless or yellow-brown.
233
Unusually, the filament grows in much the same way as a plant root, its growth being confined to a special region just behind the tip, called a meristem. Sometimes, the filament sheds the tapering tip above the growth region, enabling Calothrix to reproduce asexually by casting off fragments called hormogonia from the meristem. These fragments are able to form new filaments far away from the parent. These kinds of cyanobacteria often form slimy coatings on coastal rocks and seaweeds. At least one species of Calothrix is known to make up the photosynthetic part of some rocky shore lichens, such as Lichina pygmaea (p.257).
oceanic food chains. The bacteria form in long, multicelled filaments, in which some cells carry out nitrogen fixation, while others are specialized for photosynthesis. These tasks must be separated because the oxygen byproduct that results from photosynthesis would interfere with the nitrogenfixing process, so they cannot both occur in the same cell.
Individual filamentous colonies of the cyanobacteria Trichodesmium erythaeum are just visible to the naked eye, and these bacteria have traditionally been known as sea sawdust by mariners. Under warm conditions, the bacterium is able to multiply extremely rapidly to create massive blooms that may have such an extent that they are visible from space. This is a prolific nitrogen-fixing bacterium that harnesses about half of the nitrogen passing through
DOMAIN BACTERIA
Vibrio fischeri SIZE
0.003 mm cell length
DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide
Many marine organisms, particularly those in the deep sea, make use of bioluminescence, the biochemical emission of light. Many of these creatures depend on bacteria, such as the rod-shaped Vibrio fischeri, to generate the light, and in these cases
the bacteria live within the body of their host in a mutually beneficial relationship. The bacteria produce light using a chemical reaction that takes place inside their cells. Vibrio fischeri also occurs as a free-living organism, moving through water by means of a flagellum and feeding on dead organic matter. The distinctive, comma-shaped cells seen in Vibrio fischeri, below, are characteristic of the genus. Other Vibrio species (which are not luminescent) are responsible for the potentially fatal disease cholera.
%9%,)'(43 %YELIGHTFISHSUCHASTHEONE SHOWNBELOW HAVELIGHT EMITTING ORGANSCALLEDPHOTOPHORESUNDER EACHEYE4HELIGHTISPRODUCED BYCOLONIESOFVibrio fischeriLIVING INTHEPHOTOPHORES4HELIGHT ORGANSDISPLAYDISTINCTPATTERNS ANDMAYBEUSEDASANAIDTO RECOGNITIONANDCOMMUNICATION BETWEENFISHOFTHISSPECIES4HE ABILITYTOEMITLIGHTMAYALSOPLAY APARTINPREYCAPTUREANDTHE AVOIDANCEOFPREDATORS
DOMAIN ARCHAEA
Halobacterium salinarium SIZE
0.001–0.006 mm
DISTRIBUTION
Dead Sea and other hypersaline areas
of the world
OCEAN LIFE
Archaea that have adapted to live in waters with exceptionally high salt concentrations are called halophiles. One example of this type of organism is Halobacterium salinarium, which is rod-shaped, produces pink pigments called carotenoids, and forms extensive areas of pink scum on salt flats. The cell membranes of halophiles contain substances that make them more stable than other types of cell membranes, preventing them from falling apart in the high salt concentrations in which they live. Their cell walls are also modified, for the same reason. These bacteria obtain nourishment from organic matter in the water. In addition, their pigments absorb some light energy, which the bacteria then use for fueling processes within the cells.
234
ZOOPLANKTON
Radiolarians are animal-like protists (protozoans) that form a component of oceanic zooplankton. Their delicate arms trap food particles and aid buoyancy.
PROTISTS DOMAIN Eucarya
PROTISTS ARE MICROSCOPIC ORGANISMS,
many of which drift around with ocean currents and form a major part of the SPECIES More than 100,000 plankton. They are remarkably diverse. Many protists are single-celled and, in the past, they have been grouped together on this basis. Despite their extremely small size, they play a crucial role in the marine food chain, providing energy to all the other animals in the ocean. KINGDOMS At least 10
ANATOMY Protist body form is extremely varied. Some protists, such as diatoms and foraminiferans, have rigid outer skeletons and a fixed shape, while many unicellular protozoans, which are bounded only by a thin cell membrane, can continually change form. Radiolarians are spherical, and most have many long, delicate arms to aid buoyancy as they float passively. In contrast, flagellates have a whiplike thread on their body, which they can use to cause jerky movements. Diatoms and many dinoflagellates contain structures called chloroplasts, which turn them green. They produce food by photosynthesis and are collectively referred to as phytoplankton. Other protists, which feed on other organisms or detritus, are part of the DIFFERENT SHAPES zooplankton. Some There are 10,000 species of diatoms. protists are even Each species has a differently shaped silica skeleton. luminescent.
HABITATS Protists live in every ocean in the world. Phytoplankton need lots of sunlight to photosynthesize, so they are found only in the surface layers where light penetrates. The zooplankton migrate up and down the water column, depending on the time of day, in a process called diel migration. They come to the surface at night to feed and then sink to deeper levels during the day (see p.221). Some protists live inside other life-forms and are essential to their well-being. Single-celled algae called zooxanthellae, for example, are found in both reef corals and some species of anemone; their relationship with their host is called mutualism because both organisms benefit. Protists also live on the sea bed and even in soft, deepocean sediment, and these are considered particularly vital to marine ecosystems.
ALGAL BLOOM OFF NEWFOUNDLAND
When conditions are particularly favorable, phytoplankton multiplies rapidly, causing an algal bloom, as shown here off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.
OCEAN LIFE
SINGLE-CELLED COMPLEXITY
Foraminiferans have a rigid “shell” called a test. The test’s shape varies from species to species, but it may have a complex spiral structure (left), reminiscent of a snail’s shell. Foraminiferans’ soft bodies protrude through their tests into long, branching extensions (pseudopodia), which they use to trap food.
02/4)34/2 02/4/#4)34 5NTILRECENTLY SCIENTISTSPLACED MOSTSINGLE CELLEDEUKARYOTES INCLUDINGUNICELLULARALGAE PROTOZOANS ANDSMALL FUNGUS LIKEORGANISMS INTHETAXONOMIC GROUP0ROTISTA/THERSCIENTISTS PREFERTOUSETHETERM0ROTOCTISTA WHICHALSOINCLUDESTHEREDAND BROWNSEAWEEDS(OWEVER NEITHERISANATURALGROUP BECAUSE MANYOFTHEORGANISMSTHEY CONTAINARENOTCLOSELYRELATED
protists GROUP DIATOMS
Ethmodiscus rex DIAMETER 1/16–1/8 in HABITAT
(2–3 mm)
Warm, nutrient-poor water
DISTRIBUTION
Open ocean worldwide
Of the 10,000 species of diatoms alive today, Ethmodiscus rex is the largest. It is a single cell with a rigid cell wall, called a test, which is impregnated with silica and covered in regular rows of pits. The test is made up of two disk-shaped halves, called valves, which fit tightly together. Because each
diatom has a unique test, Ethmodiscus rex can be easily identified in the fossil record. It is found in rocks that date from the Pliocene and the fossils can be up to 5 million years old. The cells need to remain near the water surface in order to utilize the Sun’s energy for food, which they do by transforming the products of photosynthesis into oily substances that increase their buoyancy. Ethmodiscus rex can reproduce sexually but, if conditions are favorable, it multiplies rapidly, simply by dividing into two. Over a 10-day period, one individual that divides three times a day can have over 1.5 billion descendants.
GROUP DIATOMS
Coscinodiscus granii LENGTH
Up to 0.1 mm
HABITAT
Surface waters
DISTRIBUTION
Widespread in Northern Hemisphere
In bright light, the individual cells of Coscinodiscus granii appear goldenbrown. This is because the numerous
235
chloroplasts inside the cell, which are visible through the transparent silica test, contain orange-brown pigments for photosynthesis, rather than the more familiar green chlorophyll. Like Ethmodiscus rex (left), Coscinodiscus granii is disk-shaped and radially symmetrical (that is, if it is cut in half, the two halves are mirror images of each other). During replication (asexual reproduction), the two halves (valves) of the test separate so that each daughter cell inherits one valve from its parent and creates the other valve itself. In contrast, a cell that is created as a result of sexual reproduction produces both halves of its test.
valve forms one half of test
rigid cell wall (test)
GROUP DIATOMS
KINGDOM DINOFLAGELLATA
Thalassiosira nordenskioeldii LENGTH HABITAT
Ceratium tripos
0.01–0.05 mm
0.2–0.35 mm
HABITAT
Surface waters
DISTRIBUTION
Cold water
DISTRIBUTION
LENGTH
Worldwide
Northern Hemisphere
This diatom is similar in structure to Coscinodiscus granii (above right), but differs in forming colonies in which rows of individual cells are joined together at regular intervals by threads of a substance called chitin. Like many diatoms that live in cold waters, the numbers of this species fluctuate greatly over the year. In spring, they multiply rapidly, in what is referred to as a bloom, to take advantage of the warmer, more favorable conditions. In fall, their numbers drop as the water temperature decreases.
GROUP DIATOMS
Chaetoceros danicus LENGTH
0.005–0.02 mm
HABITAT
Surface waters Worldwide
First described in 1844, Chaetoceros is one of the largest and most diverse genera of marine diatoms, containing well over 100 species. Chaetoceros danicus is a colonial form, and groups of seven cells are not uncommon (as shown here). It is easily recognized
apical horn
lateral horns aid floatation
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
because it has highly distinctive long, stiff hairs, called setae, which project perpendicularly from the margins of its test. and have prominent secondary spines along their length. Chloroplasts, which contain pigments used in photosynthesis, are numerous and found inside both the cell and the setae. The setae are easily broken, and if large quantities lodge in the gills of a fish, they may kill it. The secondary spines anchor the setae to the sensitive gill tissue, causing irritation, and the fish reacts by producing mucus. Eventually, it dies from suffocation.
The unique three-pronged shape of the dinoflagellate Ceratium tripos makes it easy to identify among the phytoplankton, where it is one of the dominant organisms. Although this species is usually solitary, several individuals may be seen together, attached to each other by the single apical horn. This occurs when a cell divides and the daughter cells remain linked in short chains. Ceratium tripos is sometimes parasitized by other protists.
236
protists KINGDOM DINOFLAGELLATA
Protoperidinium depressum LENGTH
Up to 0.3 mm
HABITAT
Open water
DISTRIBUTION
KINGDOM DINOFLAGELLATA
Dinophysis acuta LENGTH
Up to 1/32 in (0.95 mm)
HABITAT
Open water
DISTRIBUTION
Cold and temperate waters worldwide
Worldwide
Like most dinoflagellates, Protoperidinium depressum is a single-celled organism with a complex armored test. It is widest in the mid-region where there is a prominent groove, called the cingulum, which encircles the body and houses a whiplike flagellum. Movement of this and a second flagellum set at right angles to it causes the typical spiral motion of the cell. This ability to move allows Protoperidinium depressum to predate other small organisms. Also capable of bioluminescence, it has been mistaken for Noctiluca scintillans (see below).
This species is one of the largest belonging to the genus Dinophysis. It is plantlike in having numerous yellow-green chloroplasts, which it uses to manufacture food by photosynthesis, but it is also animallike in being able to move using its two whiplike flagella for propulsion. The cells are oblong in shape, rounded posteriorly, and have a robust, laterally compressed test that is made up of a number of different plates. Like diatoms, most dinoflagellates have unique tests by which they can be identified even as fossils. All species of Dinophysis are toxic and have been
responsible for a number of die-offs in shellfish when blooms occur. Under certain conditions, such as a long period of calm weather, they multiply very rapidly by simple division, sometimes becoming so numerous that the water changes color. This phenomenon is referred to as a red tide. A huge amount of toxins and okadaic acid builds up in the water and passes up the food chain via shellfish in which the toxins accumulate. If the contaminated shellfish is then eaten by humans, it causes sickness and severe diarrhea. Sexual reproduction in Dinophysis acuta is not well understood, but it is thought to involve cells that in the past were described as a different species, Dinophysis dens.
cingulum near top of cell houses one of the flagella
KINGDOM DINOFLAGELLATA
Noctiluca scintillans DIAMETER HABITAT
Up to 1/16 in (2 mm)
Surface waters
DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide
Also known as sea sparkle, Noctiluca scintillans is a large dinoflagellate that lives near the surface of the ocean, where it feeds on other planktonic organisms. It has a flattened spherical body but no protective test. It is colorless, although the presence of photosynthetic organisms within the cell may give it a pink or greenish tinge. Usually only one of the two flagella is visible. The flagellum is not used in locomotion but instead sweeps food into the oral cavity and removes waste matter. To control its buoyancy, Noctiluca scintillans can adjust the concentration of its cell contents. This species, which is bioluminescent in some areas (noctiluca means “shining lantern”), may also form red tides (see opposite) and has been linked to fish and invertebrate deaths. Little is known of its complex life cycle. Reproduction can be either sexual or asexual by simple division.
OCEAN LIFE
")/,5-).%3#%.#% &LOATINGJUSTBELOWTHESURFACEOF THEWATERATNIGHT DINOFLAGELLATES ANDINPARTICULARNoctiluca scintillans ARETHEMOSTCOMMON CAUSEOFBIOLUMINESCENCEINTHE OPENOCEAN-ILLIONSOFNoctiluca scintillansCELLSTWINKLEINTHE WAVES HENCETHECOMMONNAME SEASPARKLE4HEBLUE GREENLIGHT ISEMITTEDFROMSMALLORGANELLES WITHINTHECELLSANDISGENERATED BYACHEMICALREACTION5NLIKE MANYBIOLUMINESCENTFISH IT DOESNOTDEPENDONLIGHT EMITTINGBACTERIA
protists KINGDOM FORAMINIFERA
Hastigerina pelagica LENGTH 1/4 HABITAT
in (6 mm)
Warm waters at depth of 660 ft (200 m)
Subtropical and tropical waters of North Atlantic and western Indian Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
KINGDOM DINOFLAGELLATA
Gymnodinium pulchellum DIAMETER HABITAT
0.025 mm
Surface waters
DISTRIBUTION Temperate and tropical waters above continental shelves, and Mediterranean
Some red-tide organisms such as Gymnodinium pulchellum produce toxins that affect the nervous system and the clotting properties of the blood, causing high mortality among
KINGDOM CHRYSOPHYTA
Dictyocha fibula LENGTH
0.045 mm
HABITAT
Surface waters
Atlantic, Mediterranean, Baltic Sea, and eastern Pacific off coast of Chile
fish as well as invertebrates. The cause of red tides is not well understood, but some scientists think they may be influenced by coastal pollution providing nutrients that might otherwise be in short supply and so normally limit the population size. Rapid reproduction by simple cell division results in huge numbers of Gymnodinium pulchellum being present in the water, turning it a characteristic brown-red color, as shown here in the seas around Hong Kong. Unlike many other types of dinoflagellates, this species lacks a test and also produces food by photosynthesis. Only three species of Dictyocha are alive today. They are all that remains of a group of organisms that flourished more than 5 million years ago and whose fossils are abundant in some Miocene deposits.
Foraminiferans are unicellular organisms that are found only in marine habitats. Hastigerina pelagica is one of the larger forms. It is often pinkish-red in color and has a calcareous test with several globular-shaped chambers from
237
which radiate calcite spines covered with cytoplasmic strands (pseudopodia) for collecting food. Hasterigina pelagica is unique in that it surrounds its test with a gelatinous capsule of tiny frothy bubbles, which is thought to aid buoyancy. Dinoflagellates sometimes live on the surface of the capsule, and up to 79 have been counted on a single individual, though 6–10 is more common. The relationship between the two organisms is not clearly understood, as Hasterigina pelagica is carnivorous, yet the dinoflagellates are unharmed.
globular-shaped chamber of calcareous test
calcite spines aid buoyancy
DISTRIBUTION
The golden-yellow pigments visible in this image of Dictyocha fibula indicate that it belongs to the large and complex group of golden algae known as Chrysophyta. The word Dictyocha means “net” and refers to the large windows in the silica test.
golden yellow pigments used in photosynthesis
KINGDOM CILIATA projection from silica test
Strombidium sulcatum DIAMETER HABITAT
KINGDOM RADIOLARIA
Cladococcus viminalis DIAMETER HABITAT
0.08 mm
Surface waters
DISTRIBUTION
Mediterranean
Radiolarians produce extremely complex silica tests of spines and pores that are laid down in a well-defined
geometric pattern. The spines aid buoyancy and the pores provide outlets for cell material, called pseudopodia, which engulf any food that becomes trapped on the spines and carry it to the center of the cell to be digested. Cladococcus viminalis is a polycystine radiolarian, which are the most commonly fossilized radiolarians and are frequently found in chalk and limestone rocks.
0.045 mm
Surface waters
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans
Organisms such as Strombidium sulcatum are classified as ciliates because the cell membrane has many hairlike projections, called cilia, that are used in locomotion. In Strombidium sulcatum, the cilia are restricted to a collar at one end of its spherical body. There is no test.
GROUP COCCOLITHOPHORIDS
Emiliania huxleyi DIAMETER HABITAT
0.006 mm
Surface waters
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans
very quickly in favorable conditions, when it accounts for up to 90 percent of the phytoplankton. These blooms cover areas of up to 38,600 square miles (100,000 square km) and are visible from space because they turn the water from deep blue to milky turquoise, as seen here in a satellite image taken of the coast off Cornwall, UK. The coccolithophorids cause the change in color of the water because the calcite plates act like mirrors reflecting the incoming sunlight. They have been found worldwide in chalk deposits dating from 65 million years ago. Chemicals called alkenones are present within the fossils and are used to gather information about sea surface temperatures in the past.
OCEAN LIFE
Emiliana huxleyi has a golden-yellow, free-swimming form and a resting stage, which is spherical and covered with uniquely patterned calcite plates. For many years, scientists thought the two were different organisms, classifying the active form as a haptomonad and the resting stage as a coccolithophorid. Like some other protists, Emiliana huxleyi can multiply
Among protists, ciliates have the most complex cells, with two nuclei. The macronucleus is needed for growth and reproduction, and the micronucleus is essential for sexual reproduction. Strombidium sulcatum reproduces asexually by splitting in two, but during sexual reproduction, two cells join together for a considerable period and swap parts of their micronuclei. When the genetic composition of the joined micronuclei has become identical, the cells separate again. Further changes occur and both cells then split into two. This form of sexual reproduction is called conjugation.
red and brown seaweeds
239
LIFE STRATEGIES Red and brown seaweeds must cope with a disturbed environment. Seashore and rock pool species in particular experience daily and seasonal extremes of salinity or moisture and temperature, and the attentions of animal grazers. Because of regular exposure to air when the tide is out, the most dessication-resistant brown seaweeds usually live at the top of the shore. Although they may dry out at low NEW KELP GROWS FROM OLD A new, yellow frond is growing from tide, they can rapidly absorb seawater the top of this kelp stipe. The old and resume photosynthesis as soon as frond, which will drop off, is covered the tide returns. Many seashore brown in white animals called bryozoans, which block vital photosynthesis. seaweeds produce mucus, both to keep from drying out and to deter grazers and colonizing animals. Some seaweeds are annuals, so they grow, reproduce, and die within a year. Others are perennial, or have parts from which new fronds grow each year. Many red seaweeds that colonize disturbed habitats have a two-phase life history, with conspicuous, erect filaments or fronds, present only during the calm season, and a perennial crust or creeping filament that helps it withstand abrasion during storms. These phases look so different that they were first described as separate species. The distinctive red seaweeds called coralline algae have a heavily calcified, pink frond, too hard for most grazers to eat. In some species, the frond is jointed, while others form crusts on rock. An unattached version, maerl, forms hard, free-living nodules on the sea bed. Some seaweeds are parasites of other seaweeds, obtaining at least part of their nutrition from the host. LIMPET GARDENS
On South African seashores, the pear limpet encourages fast-growing and nutritious red algae to grow on the surrounding rock, which it then grazes, fertilizes with its own waste, and defends from other limpets.
BARBED COLONIZER
This red seaweed has specialized barbed branches, enabling detached fragments to hook onto other marine growth and travel to new areas, carried either by currents or on ships’ hulls.
SEAWEED CLASSIFICATION Red and brown seaweeds have been classed as divisions, phyla, or classes of plants or protists, but here they are treated as independent kingdoms. Their defining features are their photosynthetic pigments.
To absorb nutrients, red and brown seaweeds rely on moving water. Many appear green, and they flourish on these wave-washed rocks in the Canary Islands.
RED SEAWEEDS Kingdom Rhodophyta
About 1,500–2,000 species
About 5,000–5,500 species
Of the 14 or so orders of brown seaweeds, the most conspicuous marine orders are the kelps and wracks.Their brown color is due to the pigment fucoxanthin; other yellow pigments (xanthophylls) may also be present. They also have beta carotene, and chlorophylls a, c1, and c2.
There are two classes and 18 orders of red seaweeds. The majority are in the order Gigartinales, which contains a variety of frondbearing (frondose) and crust-forming (crustose) species. The red color comes from the pigment phycoerythrin. Rhodophyta also have blue pigments, carotenoids, and chlorophyll a.
OCEAN LIFE
THRIVING IN SURF
BROWN SEAWEEDS Kingdom Phaeophyta
240
red and brown seaweeds KINGDOM PHAEOPHYTA
Limey Petticoat Padina gymnospora HEIGHT
Up to 4 in (10 cm)
Rock pools and shallow subtidal rocks
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
68–86˚F (20–30˚C) Coasts in tropical and subtropical areas worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
Padina is the only genus of brown seaweeds to have calcified fronds, hence this species’ common name of limey petticoat. The reflective chalk shows as bright white concentric bands on the upper surface of the fan-shaped fronds. The fronds are only 4–9 cells thick and curled inward. Older fronds may become split into wedge-shaped sections. This species is widespread in tropical seas, often growing in masses on shallow subtidal rocks, and on old coral and shells.
KINGDOM PHAEOPHYTA
Giant Kelp Macrocystis pyrifera LENGTH
150 ft (45 m)
Rocky sea beds, occasionally sand
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
41–68˚F (5–20˚C) Temperate waters of southern hemisphere and northeastern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Giant kelp (pictured on pp.242–43) is the largest seaweed on Earth. It can grow at the phenomenal rate of 24 in (60 cm) per day in ideal conditions, and reaches lengths of over 100 ft (30 m) in
KINGDOM PHAEOPHYTA
Oyster Thief Colpomenia peregrina DIAMETER
Up to 4 in
(10 cm) Intertidal and subtidal rocks and shells
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
49–83˚F (6–28˚C) Coasts of western North America, Japan, and Australasia; introduced in Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
The oyster thief gets its unusual name from its habit of growing on shells, including commercially grown oysters. The frond is initially spherical and solid, but as it grows, it becomes irregularly lobed and hollow and fills with gas. Sometimes, this can make it sufficiently buoyant to lift the oyster,
KINGDOM PHAEOPHYTA
KINGDOM PHAEOPHYTA
Landlady’s Wig
Sea Palm
Desmarestia aculeata
Postelsia palmaeformis
LENGTH
Up to 6 ft (1.8 m)
LENGTH
Up to 24 in
(60 cm)
Subtidal rocks, and kelp forests
HABITAT
HABITAT
Wave-exposed
shores
WATER TEMPERATURE
32–64˚F (0–18˚C)
WATER TEMPERATURE
46–64˚F (8–18˚C) DISTRIBUTION
Near coasts in temperate, cold, and
DISTRIBUTION
West Coast of North America
polar regions
OCEAN LIFE
This large seaweed has narrow brown fronds with many side-branches. Its bushy appearance is the reason for its common name of landlady’s wig. The smallest branches are short and spinelike, hence the species name aculeata, which means “prickled.” In summer, the whole plant is covered with delicate branched hairs. This species is particularly abundant on boulders and in kelp forests disturbed by waves.
Sea palms are kelps, which are large brown seaweeds that belong to the order Laminariales. Unusually for a kelp, sea palm grows on the midshore, where it forms dense stands on waveexposed coasts. It has a branched holdfast, and a stout, hollow stalk, which stands erect when the tide is low. The top of the stalk is divided into many short, cylindrical branches, each of which bears a single frond up to 10 in (25 cm) long, with toothed margins and deep grooves running down both faces. Spores are released into the grooves and drip off the frond tips onto the holdfasts and nearby rocks at low tide, so that the developing seaweeds grow as dense clumps. Some Sea palms attach to mussels and are later ripped off during storms, making more rock available for other sea palms to grow.
a year. Giant kelp normally grows at a depth of 30–100 ft (10–30 m) but can grow much deeper in very clear water. The huge branched holdfast, which is about 24 in (60 cm) high and wide after three years, is firmly attached to the seabed. From it, a number of long, flexible stalks stretch toward the surface, bearing many straplike fronds, each buoyed by a gas-filled bladder.The fronds continue to grow on reaching the surface, floating as a dense canopy. Giant kelp has a two-phase life cycle. Fronds (sporophylls) at the base of the kelp produce spores that develop into tiny creeping filaments.The filaments produce eggs and sperm, which combine to produce embryonic kelp plants. which is not attached to the seabed, and they may both be carried away by the tide. This seaweed has a thin wall with only a few layers of cells. The outer layer is made of small, angular cells which contain the photosynthetic pigments that give the oyster thief its brown color.
241
#2/&4%237)' )NVERYSHELTEREDBAYSANDSEA LOCHS DETACHEDPIECESOFªNORMAL« KNOTTEDWRACKWILLCONTINUETO GROW LYINGLOOSEONTHESEABED )NSITUATIONSWHERETHEFRONDSARE ALTERNATELYCOVEREDBYSALTAND FRESHWATER THEYDIVIDEREPEATEDLY TOFORMADENSEBALLTHATHASNO BLADDERSORREPRODUCTIVE STRUCTURES4HISATTACHEDFORM WHICHISKNOWNASCROFTERS WIG APPEARSVERYDIFFERENTFROM THEATTACHEDFORM EVENTHOUGHIT ISGENETICALLYIDENTICAL
KINGDOM PHAEOPHYTA
Knotted Wrack Ascophyllum nodosum LENGTH
Up to 10 ft (3 m)
Sheltered seashores
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
32–64˚F (0–18˚C) DISTRIBUTION Coasts of northwestern Europe, eastern North America, and north Atlantic islands
KINGDOM PHAEOPHYTA
Neptune’s Necklace Hormosira banksii LENGTH
Up to 12 in
(30 cm) Lower shore and subtidal rocks
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
50–68˚F (10–20˚C) DISTRIBUTION Coasts of southern and eastern Australia and New Zealand
Knotted wrack belongs to a group of tough brown seaweeds that often dominate rocky seashores in cooler climates. It is firmly attached to the rocks by a disk-shaped holdfast, from which arise several narrow fronds that often grow to 3 ft (1 m) in length, and exceptionally to 9 ft (3 m) in very sheltered situations. Single oval bladders grow at intervals down the frond. The fronds produces about one bladder a year, so the seaweed’s age can be roughly estimated by counting
KINGDOM PHAEOPHYTA
Japweed Sargassum muticum LENGTH 6–33 ft (2–10 m)
Intertidal and subtidal rocks and stones
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
41–79˚F (5–26˚C) Coasts of Japan, introduced in western Europe and western North America
DISTRIBUTION
Japweed can reproduce all year and forms dense stands in quiet waters. Native to Japan (hence its common name), it was accidentally introduced to western North America and Europe, and is steadily expanding its range in these areas. It outcompetes other seaweeds and in these regions is regarded as an invasive species. This long, bushy seaweed has numerous side-branches, which have many leaflike fronds up to 4 in (10 cm) long. The fronds bear small, gas-filled bladders, either singly or in clusters.
OCEAN LIFE
Neptune’s necklace is one of the many brown seaweeds endemic (unique) to New Zealand and the cooler waters around Australia. Its distinctive fronds, which look like a string of brown beads, are made up of chains of ovoid, hollow segments joined by thin constrictions in the stalk. Small reproductive structures are scattered over each “bead.” Dense mats composed almost entirely of this one species can be found on seashore rocks. The fronds are attached to the rock by a thin, diskshaped holdfast. Neptune’s necklace also lives unattached among mangrove roots. The shape of its segments varies according to habitat. They are spherical and about 3/4 in (2 cm) wide in fronds growing on sheltered rocks, in mussel beds on tidal flats, or in mangrove swamps. Fronds growing on subtidal rocks on moderately exposed coasts have smaller segments that are just 1/4 in (6 mm) long.
a series of bladders. The bladders hold the fronds up in the water so that they gain maximum light, which is an advantage in the often turbid waters where knotted wrack grows. This also makes it harder for grazing snails to reach the fronds when the tide is in. The dark brown fronds may be bleached almost to yellow in summer. Reproductive structures that look like swollen raisins are borne on short side-branches, and orange eggs can sometimes be seen oozing from them.
GIANT KELP
This enormous seaweed can grow at a rate of 20 in (50 cm) per day in favorable conditions, such as the relatively cold water off California (shown here). Air bladders help keep the kelp’s blades afloat as they grow upward toward the surface, where there is an enhanced supply of light and nutrients.
244
red and brown seaweeds KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
Laver Porphyra dioica LENGTH
Up to 20 in (50 cm) HABITAT
Intertidal rocks WATER TEMPERATURE
43–64˚F (6–18˚C) Coasts of northeastern and western Europe and Mediterranean around Italy
DISTRIBUTION
This species of red seaweed has only recently been separated from the very similar P. purpurea on the basis of how they reproduce. P. dioica is dioecious (male and female reproductive cells are on separate fronds), while P. purpurea is monoecious (male and female reproductive cells are on the same frond). P. dioica grows on intertidal, sandy rocks and is most abundant in the spring and early summer. The membranous frond is only one cell thick and is olive-green to purplebrown or blackish. This species appears to have a limited distribution in western Europe, but the genus is widespread throughout the world. All species of Porphyra are edible and are often harvested for food worldwide, especially in Japan where they are cultivated and known as nori. In the United Kingdom, wild laver is collected and made into the Welsh delicacy laverbread.
KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
Sand Weed Rhodothamniella floridula HEIGHT
Up to 11/4 in
(3 cm) Lower shore and subtidal rocks
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
40–64˚F (4–18˚C) Coasts of northeastern Europe and southern Africa
DISTRIBUTION
HUMAN IMPACT
KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
Small Jelly Weed
3%!7%%$*%,,9
Gelidium foliaceum
2EDSEAWEEDSHAVELONGBEEN COLLECTEDFORMAKINGJELLIES AND AGAREXTRACTEDFROMSPECIESOF Gelidium Gracilaria ANDPterocladia ISUSEDFORTHEPREPARATIONOFGELS ONALARGESCALE!GARGELISUSED ASAMEDIUMFORGROWINGFUNGI ANDBACTERIAINMICROBIOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS ANDINTHEFOOD INDUSTRYFORPRODUCINGJAMAND CONSERVINGMEATANDFISH
LENGTH
2 in (5 cm) HABITAT
Intertidal rocks WATER TEMPERATURE
50–68˚F (10–20˚C) Coasts of southern Africa and southern Japan
DISTRIBUTION
There are many species of Gelidium worldwide, and they are difficult to identify because the plants can look very different depending on their habitat and whether they have been grazed by seashore animals such as limpets. Ongoing work on molecular sequencing is gradually resolving some of these problems, and Gelidium foliaceum is one species that has recently been reclassified. It has a flattened, much lobed and curled frond, which grows in dense clumps on rocky seashores. The fronds are tough and cartilaginous, and the
seaweed is attached to the rock at frequent intervals by small hairlike structures, or rhizoids, from a creeping stem, or stolon. This creeping habit is probably the main method of spreading, but some species of Gelidium also reproduce sexually. Species of Gelidium are the main source of agar (see panel, right).
KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
Coral Weed Corallina officinalis LENGTH
Up to 43/4 in
(12 cm) Rock pools and shallow subtidal rocks
HABITAT
OCEAN LIFE
This seaweed consists of tiny horizontal filaments made of strings of cells, from which arise other filaments that reach a maximum height of 11/4 in (3 cm). The upright filaments have irregular side-branches, some of which interweave to form a complex network that traps sand grains. This network builds up to form a spongy mat about /2 in (1 cm) thick. The mat sometimes covers large areas of rocks that are next to sand and creates a habitat for small animals such as nematodes.
WATER TEMPERATURE
32–77˚F (0–25˚C) DISTRIBUTION
Coasts worldwide except for far north
and Antarctica
Coral weed belongs to a group of red seaweeds known as coralline seaweeds, which have chalky deposits in the cell walls that give them a hard structure.
Coral weed fronds have rigid sections that are separated by flexible joints. The branches usually lie in one plane, forming a flat, featherlike frond, but the shape is very variable. On the open shore, the fronds are often stunted, forming a short mat a few inches high in channels and rock pools and on wave-exposed rocks. These mats often harbor small animals, and other small red seaweeds attach to the hard fronds. Subtidally, the fronds grow much longer. The color of coral weed varies from dark pink when it lives in the shade to light pink in sunny locations. When the seaweed dies, its hard skeleton becomes part of the sand.
red and brown seaweeds KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
Trottoir Coralline Lithophyllum lichenoides SIZE
Not recorded
Intertidal and subtidal rocks
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
59–77˚F (15–25˚C) Coasts of western Europe, Mediterranean, and southern Africa DISTRIBUTION
KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
Irish Moss Mastocarpus stellatus LENGTH
7 in (17 cm)
Lower shore and subtidal rocks
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
32–77˚F (0–25˚C) Coasts of northeastern North America, northwestern Europe, and Mediterranean DISTRIBUTION
Trottoir coralline is one of many types of hard, encrusting coralline seaweeds that actively build chalky reefs in regions with warmer waters. The image below shows a complex coralline reef in the Mediterranean, where a low tide has exposed a horizontal platform, known as a “trottoir” (pathway), extending out from the coast. The seaweed grows best at the outer edge of the reef, where waves keep the crusts wet even during low tide. The crusts are riddled with animals that bore holes in it and live beneath it, including worms that live in hard tubes, which in turn become part of the reef structure.
This tough red seaweed is common on exposed shores, often forming a dense turf on the lower shore. Its frond is attached to rock by a diskshaped holdfast, from which arises a narrow stipe (stalk) that gradually expands into a divided blade, which is slightly rolled to form a channel with a thickened edge. Reproductive structures
KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
245
KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
Maerl
Cotton’s Seaweed
Phymatolithon calcareum DIAMETER
Kappaphycus cottonii Up to 23/4 in
LENGTH
(7 cm)
20 in (50 cm)
HABITAT
Intertidal and shallow subtidal rocks
WATER TEMPERATURE
50–86˚F (10–30˚C)
HABITAT
Subtidal seabed sediments
WATER TEMPERATURE
32–77˚F (0–25˚C) DISTRIBUTION
Coasts of Atlantic islands, northern and western Europe, Mediterranean, and Philippines
DISTRIBUTION
The term “maerl” describes various species of unattached coralline seaweeds that live on sea beds. Phymatolithon calcareum forms brittle, purple-pink, branched structures that look more like small corals than seaweed. It grows as spherical nodules at sheltered sites, or as twigs or flattened medallions at more exposed sites. In places with some water movement from waves and tides, but not enough to break the maerl nodules, extensive beds can develop. Maerl is as much a habitat as a species, and both the living maerl and the maerl-derived gravel beneath it harbor many small animals. Maerl grows slowly and the beds are vulnerable to damage from bottom trawlers.
Formerly called Eucheuma cottonii, this is a much-branched, cylindrical red seaweed that is farmed extensively in the Philippines for extraction of carrageenan, a gelling agent similar to agar (see panel opposite). In the wild, it grows attached to rocks or lies loose in sheltered places. Like some other red seaweeds, its fronds are often shades of green and brown rather than red.
housed in small nodules on the blade’s surface produce a very different seaweed in the form of a thick black crust (it was originally named Petrocelis cruenta because it was thought to be an entirely different species). Spores from this crust grow back into the erect form, in a typical two-phase life history. Mastocarpus stellatus and the similar Chondrus crispus are both known as Irish moss or carrageen moss and are collected on an industrial scale on both sides of the north Atlantic to produce the gelling agent carrageenan.
Coasts of Africa, southern and eastern Asia, and Pacific islands
KINGDOM RHODOPHYTA
Spectacular Seaweed Drachiella spectabilis LENGTH
Up to 21/2 in
(6 cm) Subtidal rocks at 6–100 ft (2–30 m)
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
46–64˚F (8–18˚C) Off western coasts of Scotland, UK, Ireland, France, and Spain
DISTRIBUTION
This colorful seaweed is rarely seen, except by divers, as it normally grows in relatively deep water, and is rarely washed ashore. It also grows in shallower water within kelp forests. It has a thin, fan-shaped frond, split into wedges, that spreads out over the rock and reattaches with small rootlike structures called rhizoids.Young plants have a purple-blue iridescence, which is lost as the seaweed ages. Sexual reproduction is unknown in this species and spores are produced asexually.
OCEAN LIFE
246
plant life
PLANT LIFE
HUMAN IMPACT
kingdom of life-forms, all of which use the pigment chlorophyll to KINGDOM Plantae fix carbon dioxide from the atmosphere into SPECIES 283,000 organic molecules, using energy from sunlight. Most organisms in the plant kingdom are “higher” plants, which evolved on land and remain land-based. Of these, several unrelated families of flowering plants (see p.252) have since returned to the sea or taken up residence on the coast. The plant kingdom, as defined in this book, also encompasses more primitive organisms that first evolved in water—the microscopic green algae (microalgae) and the green seaweeds (also a type of algae). Red and brown seaweeds (see pp.238–39) may not be related to plants, and are classified in this book as separate, non-plant kingdoms.
Beach plants grow in places used by humans for recreation. We can coexist, especially when people use paths in coastal dune areas. In fact, paths maintain low-growing plants, such as mosses, which might otherwise become overgrown. However, fragile dunes are damaged by erosion, and plants that grow only in a limited strip of coastal habitat are highly vulnerable to human development.
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PLANTS FORM A GREAT
DOMAIN Eucarya
MARINE PLANT DIVERSITY
Temperate seas are rich in phytoplankton, including green algae. Green seaweeds are commonly anchored to boulders or bedrock. F Seagrasses have true roots LIF and live in sediment in sea campion AC E S the shallow subtidal and intertidal zones, and in brackish lagoons. Above high water, cliffs, sand dunes, and salt marshes are home to flowering plants and mosses. dune flower
The sand crocus of the Canary Islands grows only in a few coastal locations on Lanzarote and Fuerteventura. It is protected, but threatened by tourism development.
TROPICAL MARINE PLANTS
Plants are united by their use of chlorophyll for photosynthesis. The higher plants include several major land-based groups, including ferns and conifers. Because higher plants evolved on land, they are adapted to life in air and to fresh water. They have tissues bearing vessels that transport water and food. Of the higher plants, it is mainly the flowering plants (the largest group) that have invaded marine habitats. Along with mosses, they inhabit the coastal fringes, with only the seagrasses being fully marine. Green seaweeds and microscopic green algae (microalgae) lack stems and roots, have neither woody tissues nor transport vessels, and are mostly aquatic. TEMPERATE MARINE PLANTS
SAND CROCUS
mangrove tree
Seagrasses are abundant in tropical lagoons, and green seaweeds include calcified species. Mangroves line estuaries and creeks, and other flowering plants, including shrubs and trees, colonize the back of sandy beaches. Although not shown here, seaweeds may grow seasonally on rocky shores.
H AC
BE
P
VE RO
AM SW
coconut palm
NG
MA
high tide mark intertidal zone of beach mermaid’s wine glass alga, Acetabularia Halophila sea grass clear water with few algae
roseroot
S
NE
moss
DU
SH
marram grass
OR
E
green seaweeds in tidal rock pool
thrift
SH AR
Caulerpa seaweed
green seaweeds on intertidal rocks
TM AL
LA GO
ON
sea lettuce seaweed CO RA on boulders and LR bedrock EE Codium seaweed F on boulders and bedrock
S
OCEAN LIFE
brackish lagoon
SEA ROCKET
Ulva seaweed in channel sea rocket above high tide intertidal zone
ED
ER ELT -SH RE I M O SE SH
eelgrass in sediment in subtidal zone surface water thick with green microalgae
ED ER ELT RE H S HO S
D SE PO EX ORE SH
A European member of the brassica family, sea rocket can grow on pure sand, just above high tide, where it traps sand, forming small foredunes. Its waxy leaves repel sea spray, while its stubby fruit pods are dispersed by the tide.
plant life
247
ABOVE HIGH WATER
PLANTS OF SHIFTING SHORES
Sea mayweed, with abundant white flowers, and oyster plants, with their dark blue-green leaves, are salt-tolerant flowering plants that grow on semi-sheltered shores of shingle.
Above the reach of the highest tides, the environment is essentially terrestrial, but its proximity to the sea makes life hard for all but a few specialized flowering plants and mosses. In places, the coast is covered with dunes of sand blown from the seashore. Dunes tend to be alkaline, because they are rich in calcium carbonate from the skeletons of marine organisms, and they are largely devoid of the humus that makes soil fertile. Dunes therefore support only hardy colonizers, tolerant of alkaline, infertile conditions. Marram, a grass with a fast-growing root network, and golden dune moss stabilize the dunes and take the first steps toward soil formation. Plants that can fix nitrogen in root nodules, such as the casuarina tree, have an advantage here. Farther inland, a wider variety of plants grow, but in more acidic soil, the plants characteristic of the shore become replaced by inland species. On rocky cliffs, plants are safe from large grazing animals, and more leafy plants often grow here, their roots reaching deep into rock crevices for moisture draining from the land.
ABOVE AND BELOW THE TIDE LINE
Forms of marine plant range from coastal plants above the high-tide mark, such as the coconut palm, to wholly aquatic, marine flowering plants, such as seagrass, below it.
BETWEEN THE TIDES Plants between the tides have to live both in and out of water in conditions sometimes hot, dry, and salty, and at other times drenched with cold, fresh rainwater. Such intertidal zones support a small number of green seaweeds, seagrasses, and mangroves. Green seaweeds dry out quickly, so they are often confined to rock pools and freshwater seeps and streams on the upper shore. Lower down, they grow among or beneath tough brown seaweeds. Many are ephemeral, growing quickly in fair conditions and dispersing many spores. They may quickly cover tropical coasts where monsoons bring humid conditions, but then dry up and blow away when the sun returns. Seagrasses grow on lower intertidal flats; here the sediments retain moisture until the tide returns. In the tropics, mangroves colonize intertidal sediments, but only their roots are regularly submerged, while the rest of the plant remains in the air. In colder climates, salt-marsh vegetation develops on mudflats.
SUBMERGED SALT MARSH
The salt-tolerant sea pink grows in salt marshes, which develop on sheltered coasts in temperate regions. Like other salt-marsh plants, the sea pink is submerged only in the highest tides.
AQUATIC PLANTS
OCEAN LIFE
Only green microalgae, seaweeds, and seagrasses live permanently submerged in seawater. Green seaweeds can absorb nutrients and gases over their whole body surface, so they do not need the transport systems of land plants, and their holdfast simply attaches them to the seabed. Seagrasses have a land-plant anatomy, so they need extra structures such as air spaces (lacunae) to aid gas exchange. Plants living in seawater can only thrive in the top few yards, because the light necessary SEAWEED BED for growth cannot penetrate Green seaweeds in the English Channel include beyond this. Marine plants Codium (in the foreground) must also deter grazing and sea lettuce (lower right). marine invertebrates, They grow together with an sometimes by producing unrelated brown seaweed toxic or distasteful chemicals. called serrated wrack.
248
plant life
GREEN SEAWEEDS
frond
to be seen with the naked eye are known as green seaweeds. They are classified with the microscopic green algae, or microalgae (see p.250). True plants of the sea, they have pigments and other features in common with higher plants. They can be abundant in tropical lagoons, and proliferate seasonally on many temperate seashores. Ulva (sea lettuce) is grown for food.
GREEN ALGAE LARGE ENOUGH
DOMAIN Eucarya KINGDOM Plantae DIVISION Chlorophyta CLASSES 4 SPECIES 1,200
large, fibrous holdfast
SEAWEED BODY PARTS
Green seaweeds have a simple structure, with an erect frond and a disk-shaped or fibrous holdfast. This tropical Udotea species has calcified fronds with many branched siphons.
HABITATS
ANATOMY
Green seaweeds often attach to rocks on rocky coasts, particularly in temperate and cold waters, and are ephemeral colonizers in seasonally disturbed tidal and shallow subtidal habitats. Ulva species, such as sea lettuce, dominate in high-level rock pools, or where fresh water seeps over the shore, since they can withstand changes in saltiness and temperature. The more delicate Cladophora and Bryopsis species live in rock pools or among red and brown seaweeds in the shallow subtidal zone. Green seaweeds also thrive in shallow, tropical lagoons, where species of Caulerpa, Udotea, and Halimeda are often abundant. Caulerpa species have runners (stolons), which creep through sand or cling to rock, while the bases of Udotea and Halimeda are a bulbous mass of fibers that anchor in sand. Halimeda (cactus seaweed) is heavily encrusted with calcium carbonate, which breaks up when the plant dies, contributing to the lagoon sand.
The body structure of green seaweeds lacks stems and roots. Green seaweed shapes range from threadlike (filamentous) to tubes, flat sheets, and more complex forms. Their bright green color is due to the fact that their chlorophyll is not masked by additional pigments, unlike red and brown seaweeds. Many of the features of green algae, including their types of chlorophyll, are shared by higher plants (mosses, liverworts, and vascular plants), so green seaweeds appear to be more closely related to higher plants than to red and brown seaweeds.
FRAGILE FRONDS
This delicate Bryopsis plumosa has coenocytic fronds, meaning its fronds do not have the crosswalls common in other green seaweeds.
CODIUM FOREST
This mini-forest of Codium fragile is growing on shallow rocks in a sheltered bay in Scotland. The fronds are buoyant, holding the plants up to the light.
FLEXIBLE SEAWEED
Able to handle fluctuations in salinity and temperature, Ulva species thrive in this freshwater stream as it flows across the seashore.
CLASS ULVOPHYCEAE
Flaccid Green Seaweed Ulothrix flacca SIZE
Up to 4 in (10 cm)
Intertidal on various shore types
HABITAT HABITAT
CLASS ULVOPHYCEAE
Sea Lettuce Ulva lactuca SIZE
Up to 40 in (100 cm)
Intertidal and shallow subtidal
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
32–86˚F (0–30˚C)
32–68˚F
(0–20˚C)
OCEAN LIFE
attached to its rock by a single cell called a basal cell, which may be given additional anchorage by outgrowths called rhizoids. This seaweed reproduces by releasing up to a hundred gametes, each with two flagellae, from some of the cells. In another phase of its life cycle it is a single globular cell.
Northern Atlantic, Mediterranean, waters off South Africa, Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This seaweed is made up of many unbranched green filaments, which themselves consist of strings of cells. The filaments form soft, woolly masses or flat green layers that stick to intertidal rocks. Each filament is
DISTRIBUTION
Coastal waters worldwide
Sea lettuce is common worldwide on seashores and in shallow subtidal areas, growing in a wide range of conditions and habitats. Its frond is a bright green, flat sheet, which is often split or divided, and has a wavy edge. The plant is very variable in shape and size, ranging from short, tufted plants on exposed shores to
sheets over a yard long in sheltered, shallow bays, especially where extra nutrients are available in polluted harbors. Sea lettuce reproduces by releasing gametes from some cells, and it can also spread vegetatively by regeneration of small fragments. Large fronds lying on the seabed may be full of holes made by grazing animals. It is a also popular food for humans in many parts of the world.
green seaweeds CLASS CLADOPHOROPHYCEAE
Giant Cladophora Cladophora mirabilis LENGTH
Up to 40 in (100 cm) HABITAT
Subtidal rocks and kelp WATER TEMPERATURE
50–59˚F (10–15˚C) DISTRIBUTION
Southern Atlantic off southwest
Africa
CLASS BRYOPSIDOPHYCEAE
Sea Grapes Caulerpa racemosa HEIGHT
Up to 12 in (30 cm) HABITAT
Shallow sand and rock WATER TEMPERATURE
59–86˚F (15–30˚C) CLASS CLADOPHOROPHYCEAE
Sailor’s Eyeball Valonia ventricosa SIZE
Up to 11/2 in (4 cm)
Rock and coral to 100 ft (30 m)
HABITAT
WATER TEMPERATURE
50–86˚F (10–30˚C) DISTRIBUTION Western Atlantic, Caribbean, Indian and Pacific oceans
CLASS BRYOPSIDOPHYCEAE
This odd seaweed looks like a dark green marble, and consists of a single large cell attached to the substrate (which is often coral rubble) by a cluster of filaments called rhizoids. Younger plants have a bluish sheen, but older ones become overgrown with encrusting coralline red seaweeds. Sailor’s eyeball has an unusual way of reproducing vegetatively: daughter cells are formed within the parent, which then degenerates, releasing the young plants in the process.
DISTRIBUTION
Warm waters worldwide
This seaweed has creeping stolons (stems) that anchor it to rocks or in sand, and from which arise upright shoots covered with round sacs, or vesicles, hence the common name sea grapes. Each plant is a single huge cell. Old plants may become densely branched and entangled, growing to 6 ft (2 m) across. There are many varieties of sea grapes, and around 60 species of Caulerpa worldwide.
249
A giant among Cladophora species, C. mirabilis grows to 40 in (1 m) long. It is bluish green and filamentous, with many straggly side-branches. It is made up of strings of cells, but individual cells in the main axis may be 1/2 in (12 mm) long. The plant attaches using a disk made of interwoven extensions of its basal cell, and often has red algae growing on it. It has a very limited distribution in South Africa, but other species of Cladophora are common worldwide.
+),,%23%!7%%$ !STRAINOFCaulerpa taxifoliaTHAT ISWIDELYUSEDINMARINEAQUARIUMS ISANINVASIVESPECIES)TISTOXIC TOGRAZERS GROWSRAPIDLY AND FORMSADENSE SMOTHERINGCARPET ONTHESEABED)NITWAS DISCOVEREDINTHE-EDITERRANEAN OFF-ONACO ANDHASSINCESPREAD RAPIDLYALONGTHECOAST ALTERING NATIVEMARINECOMMUNITIES
CLASS BRYOPSIDOPHYCEAE
Cactus Seaweed
Velvet Horn
Halimeda opuntia
Codium tomentosum SIZE
SIZE
Up to 10 in (25 cm)
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
Intertidal pools, shallow subtidal rocks
HABITAT
HABITAT
Rock and sand
WATER TEMPERATURE
46–86˚F (8–30˚C)
WATER TEMPERATURE
68–86˚F (20–30˚C) DISTRIBUTION
Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and western
DISTRIBUTION
Coastal waters worldwide
Pacific
CLASS DASYCLADOPHYCEAE
Mermaid’s Wineglass Acetabularia acetabulum SIZE
11/4 in (3 cm)
calcium carbonate, and it terminates in a small cup. The cup is made up of fused rays that produce reproductive cysts. The cysts are released after the remainder of the plant has decayed, and they then require a period of dormancy in the dark before they begin to germinate.
HABITAT
Shallow subtidal rocks WATER TEMPERATURE
50–77˚F (10–25˚C) Eastern Atlantic off North Africa, Mediterranean, Red Sea, Indian Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
This curious little green alga grows in clusters on rocks or shells covered with sand in sheltered parts of rocky coasts within its range. Although it grows to 11/2 in (3 cm), it consists of just one cell. Its calcified frond appears white because it is encrusted with
OCEAN LIFE
The heavily calcified skeletons of species of Halimeda contribute much of the calcareous sediment in the tropics. The plant consists of strings of flattened, kidney-shaped, calcified segments, linked by uncalcified, flexible joints. By day, its chloroplasts are in the outer parts of the frond; at night they withdraw deep into the plant’s skeleton. This, along with sharp crystals of aragonite, and the presence of toxic substances in the frond, protects them from nocturnal grazing.
The spongy fronds of velvet horn are made up of interwoven tubes, arranged rather like a tightly packed bottlebrush, with each tube ending in a swollen bulb. Many of these bulbs packed together make up the outside of the frond, which is usually repeatedly branched in two. Many short, fine hairs cover the seaweed, giving it a fuzzy appearance when in water. The plants are attached to rocks by a spongy holdfast. Although this seaweed is present year-round, its maximum development is in winter, and it also reproduces during the winter months.Velvet horn, like all Codium species, is often grazed by sacoglossans, small sea slugs that suck out the seaweed’s contents, but can keep the photosynthetic chloroplasts alive and use them to make sugars inside their own tissues. The chloroplasts color the sea slugs green, which helps to disguise them from predators. There are about 50 species of Codium.
250
plant life
ANATOMY
GREEN ALGAE THESE MICROSCOPIC, MOSTLY single-celled
DOMAIN Eucarya KINGDOM Plantae
plants live in the surface layers of the ocean in CLASS Prasinophyceae immense numbers, and they form an important SPECIES 200 part of the phytoplankton (see p.212). Sometimes referred to as the “grasses of the sea,” like most plants, they produce their own food through photosynthesis. Large green algae, visible to the naked eye, are called green seaweeds and are discussed elsewhere in this book (see p.248). Microscopic algae are often termed “microalgae.” Green microalgae are frequently classified as protists. Numerous other groups of protists (see p.234) are also termed algae, and also live as phytoplankton. DIVISION Chlorophyta
HABITATS With a few exceptions, marine microalgae swim and float, in countless millions, in the sunlit layers of the ocean so that photosynthesis can occur. They are more numerous in nutrient-rich waters, such as those benefiting from coastal runoff. In temperate coastal waters, green microalgae multiply rapidly each spring in response to rising nutrient and light levels, creating abundant food for zooplankton. Such population explosions, or blooms, can reduce the water clarity for weeks. Some green algae live inside the bodies of animals (see panel, right) and inside protist plankton—in the appendages (rhizopoda) of radiolarians (see p.237) and within compartments inside the dinoflagellate Noctiluca (see p.236).
HALOSPHAERA
These microalgae (shown greatly enlarged) are green with chlorophyll and bear hairlike swimming appendages called flagellae.
Marine microscopic green algae mostly belong to a class of algae called the Prasinophyceae. Each consists of a single living cell that is generally too small to be visible to the naked human eye. Even the larger species, such as members of the genera Halosphaera and Pterosperma, measure just 0.1–0.8 mm across, so appear as no more than a speck. Some green algae can swim, and beat two or more hairlike structures, called flagellae, to move through the water. Others lack flagellae and cannot propel themselves. Several groups of these plants have a two-stage life history, including both swimming and non-swimming forms. All green algae possess chloroplasts—structures '2%%."%!#(%3 that contain the green pigment chlorophyll !FEWGREENALGAEANDWORMS that plants use in FORMSYMBIOTICPARTNERSHIPS IN WHICHBOTHSPECIESGAIN4HE photosynthesis. BEACH LIVINGWORMSINGESTALGAE GIVINGTHEMAGREENCOLOR!T LOWTIDE THEYMOVEUPTHROUGH THESANDTOPOOLSONTHESURFACE WHERETHEALGAEPHOTOSYNTHESIZE )NRETURN THEWORMSABSORBFOOD FROMTHEALGAE6ASTNUMBERSOF THEWORMSTINGEBEACHESGREEN
ANIMAL–ALGA PARTNERSHIP
When young, these marine flatworms ingest green algae, which may multiply until there are 25,000 algal cells living in each worm. The adult worms obtain all their nutrition from the algae.
GREEN TIDE
Green algae grow quickly and are the first to respond in spring when nutrients become available. While grazer levels are low, the algae are free to multiply until their density turns the ocean green.
CLASS PRASINOPHYCEAE
Halosphaera viridis SIZE
20–30 micrometers (motile phase)
CLASS PRASINOPHYCEAE
Tetraselmis convolutae SIZE
10 micrometers
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
Northeastern Atlantic, eastern Pacific
Halosphaera viridis is a small, pearshaped cell with four swimming flagellae at one end. It reproduces by splitting in two, allowing it to reach high concentrations and from time to time some cells become small cysts whose contents divide into small disks. Each disk eventually becomes a flagellated cell that will be released into the sea. There can be hundreds of cysts per square yard in the open ocean, and they are probably a vital food source for larger zooplankton.
Northeastern Atlantic, off the western coasts of Britain and France
DISTRIBUTION
Although it can survive free-living, the tiny cells of Tetraselmis convolutae often live inside a worm host (see box, above) in a symbiotic relationship. The worm provides them with shelter and a constant environment inside its body. The worm’s lightseeking behavior gives the algae ideal conditions for photosynthesis, which in turn provides both algae and worm with nutrients and energy.
mosses
251
ANATOMY
MOSSES MOSSES ARE LOW-GROWING
plants that thrive in damp habitats on land, KINGDOM Plantae where they may carpet the ground or DIVISION Bryophyta rocks. They dislike salty environments SPECIES At least 10,000 and only a few species manage to live in the intertidal zone of coasts, mainly in cooler climates. A much wider variety of mosses can be found slightly farther inland, away from the direct effects of sea spray but within range of moisture-laden sea mists. DOMAIN Eucarya
Most mosses have a recognizable structure of stems and leaves, which, as in other plants, gather sunlight and perform photosynthesis. However, unlike flowering plants (see p.252), they do not have woody tissues for support, and they also lack the conducting tissues that transport water and nutrients. Mosses have a very thin outer layer of cells, or cuticle, that can absorb (and lose) water, nutrients, and gases over their entire surface. Their “roots” are simple strands called rhizoids, which anchor the plant to its growing surface. Mosses SPORE PRODUCTION reproduce sexually by means of Mosses have low-growing leaves, but sprout wind-blown spores, or asexually taller structures with bulbous tips called capsules, from which spores are released. by spreading across the ground.
HABITATS Mosses generally prefer moist, shady places and are most numerous in the cooler and damper climates of temperate regions. This is because they lack the thick cuticle that enables other types of plant to retain moisture. Without the protection of this skinlike surface, mosses soon shrivel up in dry conditions. However, some mosses have an amazing capacity to recover quickly when wetted after a long period of drought. A few species grow in salt marshes or among the lichens at the top of rocky shores; on sheltered coasts, where there is little salt spray, they may live only just above the high tide level. Sand-dune mosses grow rapidly to keep pace with accumulating sand, and blown fragments of moss can colonize new areas of dunes. Many more moss species grow on sea cliffs and in damp gullies away from the intertidal zone. SYNTRICHIA RURALIFORMIS
This moss grows in coastal sand dunes. Its leaves curl up when dry (left of picture) but unfurl a few minutes after wetting (on right).
CLASS BRYOPSIDA
CLASS BRYOPSIDA
CLASS BRYOPSIDA
Golden Dune Moss
Salt marsh Moss
Seaside Moss
Syntrichia ruraliformis
Hennediella heimii
Schistidium maritimum
SIZE 1/2 –11/2 in
(1–4 cm)
Yellow-green to orange-brown cushions and carpets
FORM
HABITAT
Mobile dunes
SIZE 1/8 in FORM
(3 mm)
SIZE
Single green
1 in (2 cm)
Dark blackish green, compact cushions
FORM
plants Salt marshes, other coastal areas
Hard, acidic rocks, salt marshes
HABITAT
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Eastern Pacific, northwestern Atlantic, Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION Patchy distribution on temperate and cool waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
This is one of the first mosses to colonize mobile dunes. It often forms extensive colonies that cover many square yards of sand, giving the sand a golden tinge. Its leaves are covered by hundreds of small papillae that enable swift absorption of water. The leaves gradually taper into long white hair points. This moss is able to establish new plants from fragments dispersed by the wind.
This tiny moss is a halophyte, meaning it is adapted to growing in highly saline conditions. It is rarely found growing inland. One of the few mosses that may be regularly found in salt marshes, it grows on patches of bare ground between the other vegetation in the upper parts of the salt marsh. It also grows in various other coastal habitats, including the banks of creeks, behind sea walls, and on footpaths. Although small, the plants may be abundant and may appear conspicuous from a distance, due to their prolific number of stout, dark, rusty-brown capsules, which are borne on short stalks less than 1/2 in (1 cm) tall. These have a little cap with a long point, which lifts to allow spores to escape, but remains attached to the capsule by a central stalk. The Salt marsh Moss has a wide distribution in colder climates.
This moss grows as small, dark green cushions on hard, acidic rocks, with seashore lichens, just above high-tide mark. It also occurs in salt marshes. It is often soaked by salt spray and occasionally covered by
the highest tides. Seaside moss appears to be a true halophyte, functioning normally even after immersion in sea water for a few days, and growing only in saline conditions; in Britain, it is found no farther than 1,300 ft (400 m) from the sea. Its leaves curl when dry. In winter, it produces small brown capsules on short stalks.
Western and eastern coasts of North America, coasts of western Europe
CLASS BRYOPSIDA
Southern Beach Moss SIZE
1–5 in (2–13 cm) FORM
Black cushions and mats HABITAT
Rocks Southern tip of South America, islands in the Southern Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Muelleriella crassifolia
This moss is the southern version of seaside moss (see above), growing on coastal rocks in the usually lichendominated splash zone, where it is often inundated by the sea in stormy weather. It grows in southern Chile and on subantarctic islands, where it can become dominant. On Heard Island, for example, a salt spray community of plants found on exposed coastal lava rock, at elevations of less than 16 ft (5 m), is dominated by southern beach moss, which has also colonized derelict buildings.
252
plant life
FLOWERING PLANTS PLANTS CONQUERED LAND, and then land-based flowering plants KINGDOM Plantae grew to be among the most DIVISION Trachaeophyta abundant and diverse life-forms CLASS Angiospermae on Earth. However, relatively SPECIES 235,000 few have adapted to the poor soil, salt spray, and drying wind of coastal dunes and cliffs. These few include some fascinating plants found nowhere else. Few flowering plants have returned to the sea: salt-marsh plants and mangroves get wet at high tide, but only the seagrasses live fully submerged. DOMAIN Eucarya
ANATOMY
OCEAN LIFE
Flowering plants, technically called angiosperms, uniquely possess fruit and flowers, unlike mosses, seaweeds, and other algae. They are adapted to life in air, absorbing fresh water through their roots. If they take salt water into their vascular system, water from their own cell sap is attracted to the more concentrated salts and sucked out by osmosis. This is fatal to cells, but mangroves cope by excreting the salt, while succulents partition it within their cells. Seagrasses have fully adapted by matching their cells’ salt concentration to that of seawater. Most seagrasses have a similar form, with thin, grasslike blades that allow easy exchange of nutrients and gases. Mangroves grow in mud that lacks oxygen by growing aerial roots to waterproof assist gas exchange in their underground roots. Many seed case angiosperm seeds are killed by seawater, but those of the coconut can stay viable at sea for long periods inside a waterproof case. Seagrasses are germinating water-pollinated, and to plant GERMINATING SEED increase the chances of a This coconut is a fruit—a defining pollen grain catching onto characteristic of flowering plants. The a female stigma, pollen is coconut has the marine adaptations of buoyancy and a waterproof case. released as a sticky string.
SEAWATER PLANTS Seagrasses are monocotyledons (the group of flowering plants with narrow, straplike leaves), but are not true grasses, and they do not share a single evolutionary origin. There are 59 species in 5 families, although the Ruppiaceae, living mainly in brackish water, is not always accepted as a seagrass family. Salt-marsh plants are mainly small and herbaceous, with early colonizers including the salt-excreting cord grass and small succulents, such as common glasswort. Further salt-tolerant flowering plants grow farther up the shore in established salt marshes, forming a dense, grassy turf. Salt marshes (see p.124) form in cooler climates, and are replaced in tropical seas by mangroves—trees with characteristic aerial roots. There are 16 families and 54 species of mangroves. Like seagrasses, they do not have a single origin, so the mangrove habit evolved separately, several times. EELGRASS MANGROVES SUBMERGED
When the tide is in, mangroves form a mini-jungle of arching roots where small fish hide.
Seagrasses, such as this eelgrass in a Scottish sea loch, can be found from the cold waters of Alaska to tropical seas.
COASTAL PLANTS A greater variety of flowering plants can grow above the high-water mark. Salt-tolerant grasses are important constituents of the upper parts of salt marshes, and at the seaward edge of sand-dune systems, grasses are often the first to stabilize the shifting sand. In sand and sheltered gravel at the top of the shore, a few deep-rooted plants grow. A much wider variety of flowers and a few mosses colonize sand dunes and slacks just inland from the coast. Here they are subjected to salt spray but never inundated by tides. Nitrogen fixers thrive in these poor, sandy soils. In warmer climates, annuals bloom like desert flowers after seasonal rains. On cliff-tops, plants may be fertilized by sea-bird guano, stimulating lush growth.
DUNE-SLACK FLORA COASTAL FLOWERS
The beautiful pink flower heads of sea pink transform rocky seashores and salt marshes in late spring. The sea pink’s compact cushions resist wind and cold.
Here, in dune slacks behind a beach in the Canary Islands, annual plants bloom for a short period after rain. They flower and produce seeds quickly before drying up in the summer sun.
flowering plants ORDER NAJADALES
ORDER HYDROCHARITALES
Marram grass is a tall, spiky grass that plays a key role in binding coastal sand and building sand dunes. Its underground stems (rhizomes) spread
through loose sand, and upright shoots develop regularly along their length. When the tangle of stems and leaves impede onshore breezes, sand carried in the wind is deposited. Progressively, the sand builds up, the stems grow up through the sand, and a sand dune is formed. In dry weather, the leaves curl into a tube. The underside of the leaf then forms the outer surface and its waxy coating helps to reduce water loss from the plant. Marram grass is widely planted to stabilize eroded dunes, and has been introduced for this purpose to North America (where it is known as European beach grass), Chile, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand.
thick, waxy skin. It is able to prevent the salt absorbed through its roots from doing any damage by locking it away in vacuoles (small cavities) within its cells. The plant stores water inside its succulent stems, hence its cactuslike shape. For centuries, glasswort was gathered and burned to
produce an ash rich in soda (impure sodium carbonate). The ash was then baked and fused with sand to make crude glass—hence its common name. Glasswort can also be eaten boiled or pickled in vinegar. It has a mild, salty flavor, and is also known as poor man’s asparagus.
ORDER POALES
Neptune Grass
Paddle Weed
Marram Grass
Posidonia oceanica
Halophilia ovalis
Ammophila arenaria
TYPE
TYPE
TYPE
Perennial
Perennial
Perennial
HEIGHT
HEIGHT
HEIGHT
12 in (30 cm)
21/2 in (6 cm)
11/2 –4 ft (0.5–1.2 m)
HABITAT
HABITAT
HABITAT
Rocks and sand DISTRIBUTION
Mediterranean
Sand Coasts of Florida, East Africa, Southeast Asia, Australia, and Pacific islands
DISTRIBUTION
Neptune grass (also known as Mediterranean tapeweed) forms meadows from shallow water to a depth of 150 ft (45 m) in the clearest waters. It grows on both rock and sand, and has a tough, fibrous base and persistent rhizomes (stems) that grow both horizontally and vertically. These build up into a structure known as “matte,” which can be several yards high and thousands of years old. Around the island of Ischia, Italy, more than 800 species have been associated with Neptune grass beds.
Coastal sand dunes Western Europe and Mediterranean (natural occurrence); introduced elsewhere
DISTRIBUTION
253
Members of the genus Halophila look quite unlike other seagrasses, having small, oval leaves that are borne on a thin leaf stalk. As its scientific name indicates, paddle weed is particularly tolerant of high salinities (halophila means “salt-loving”). Pollination takes place underwater, and the tiny, oval pollen grains are released in chains, which assemble into rafts like floating feathers. This is thought to increase the chances of pollination of a female flower. Despite its small size, paddle weed is an important food for the dugong (see p.423). An adult can eat more than 90 lb (40 kg) of it in a day.
ORDER CARYOPHYLLALES
Common Glasswort TYPE
Annual
4–12 in (10–30 cm)
HEIGHT
Coastal mudflats and salt marshes
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Coasts of western and eastern North America, western Europe, and Mediterranean
Glasswort, also known as marsh samphire, is an early colonizer of the lower levels of salt marshes and mudflats, where plants are inundated twice a day by the tide. It is a small, cactuslike plant with bright green stems that later turn red. The tiny flowers and scalelike leaves are sunk into depressions in the fleshy stem. Glasswort is protected externally from salt water and moisture loss by a
OCEAN LIFE
Salicornia europaea
254
plant life ORDER PLUMBAGINALES
Common Sea Lavender Limonium vulgare
in Wales, while others are only found in parts of Sicily or Corsica.Varieties of sea lavender, often called statice, are grown commercially as “everlasting” flowers. The colored, papery “flowers” are actually what remains after the true flowers have fallen.
ORDER PAPAVERALES
Yellow Hornedpoppy Glaucium flavum
Perennial
Biennial or perennial
HEIGHT
HEIGHT
TYPE
TYPE
8–20 in (20–50 cm)
20–36 in (50–90 cm)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Gravel, sometimes sand
Muddy salt marshes DISTRIBUTION
Coasts of western Europe, Mediterranean, Black Sea, and Red Sea
DISTRIBUTION
Coasts of western Europe, Mediterranean, and Black Sea
This showy plant, which flowers in late summer, often forms dense colonies in salt marshes, particularly along the sides of muddy creeks. Several closely related species of sea lavender are highly localized in their distribution. For example, two species are confined to two rocky peninsulas
Also known as yellowhorn poppy, this plant has leaves covered in a waxy coating to protect it from salt spray and reduce water loss. Its taproot penetrates deep into shingle in search of water beneath. It blooms through most of the summer, producing flowers that are up to 31/2 in (9 cm) across.
ORDER MYRTALES
ORDER POLEMONIALES
Beach Morningglory
Pacific Stiltmangrove
Ipomoea imperati
Rhizophora stylosa TYPE
Perennial
LENGTH
HABIT
Woody perennial
Commonly 16– 26 ft (5–8 m), but can be up to 130 ft (40 m)
Up to 16 ft
HEIGHT
(5 m) Coastal beaches and grasslands
HABITAT
HABITAT
Intertidal
mudflats Widespread on many coasts and islands with tropical or warm temperate climates
DISTRIBUTION
This pioneer plant helps to stabilize coastal sands, creating a habitat into which other species move. It can endure low nutrient levels, high soil temperatures, abrasion and burial by blown sand, and occasional frosts, but not hurricanes, according to studies in Texas. It also grows occasionally on disturbed ground inland. Beach morning-glory is recorded on six continents and many isolated islands.
PROFILE CAPPARALES
Scurvy-grass Cochlearia officinalis Biennial or perennial
HABIT
4–16 in (10–40 cm)
HEIGHT
Coastal rocks and salt marshes
HABITAT
Coasts of northern Europe and Asia and northern North America
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
The thick, fleshy leaves of this coastal plant help it to store water in an environment where fresh water soon drains away (scurvy-grass plants found on mountains have thinner leaves and may belong to a different species). Scurvy-grass leaves are rich in vitamin C. They were once eaten, or pulped and drunk, to prevent scurvy—a disease caused by vitamin C deficiency to which sailors were prone (“grass” is Old English for any green plant).
Coasts of northern Australia, Southeast Asia, and South Pacific islands
DISTRIBUTION
The aerial roots of Pacific stiltmangroves arch down from the main trunk, with secondary roots coming off the primary ones before they reach the ground to form a tangle of roots growing in all directions. When the tide is in, these form a sheltered refuge for many small fish. This species of mangrove can tolerate a wide range of soils, but thrives best in the fine, muddy sediments of river estuaries. Its roots absorb water selectively, so much of the damaging salt is not taken up, but it still has to excrete some salt through the leaves.
flowering plants ORDER CARYOPHYLLALES
Grand Devil’s-claw Pisonia grandis TYPE
Woody perennial
46–98 ft (14–30 m)
HEIGHT
Coastal and island forests
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Coasts and islands in Indian Ocean, Southeast Asia, and South Pacific
ORDER ARECALES
The grand devil’s-claw is typically found on small tropical islands and its distribution is associated with sea bird colonies. It can grow as tall as 98 ft (30 m), the trunk can be up to 61/2 ft (2 m) in diameter, and it is often the dominant tree in coastal forests that are undisturbed by humans. The trees provide nesting and roosting sites for many species of seabirds, whose guano is an important fertilizer on isolated islands. The branches break easily, and can root in the ground.
")2$ +),,).' 42%% 4HESEEDSOFGRANDDEVILS CLAW AREPRODUCEDINCLUSTERSOF ¨ANDEXUDEARESINTHAT MAKESTHEMEXTREMELYSTICKY 4HEYATTACHTOTHEFEATHERSOFSEA BIRDSANDMAYSUBSEQUENTLYBE FLOWNTOREMOTEISLANDS4HISIS ANEFFECTIVEMEANSOFDISPERSAL BUTTHESEEDSARESOSTICKYTHAT SMALLBIRDSOFTENBECOME COMPLETELYENTANGLEDANDDIE
255
ORDER CASUARINALES
Casuarina Casuarina equisetifolia TYPE
Woody perennial
66–98 ft (20–30 m)
HEIGHT
Coastal and island forests
HABITAT
Southeast Asia, eastern Australia, and islands in southeast Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Casuarina has many common names, including beach she-oak, beefwood, ironwood, and Australian pine. It is typically found at sea level, but also grows inland to 2,600 ft (800 m). Casuarina is fast-growing, reaching a height of 65 ft (20 m) in 12 years. It is drought-tolerant, and can grow in poor soils because it can fix nitrogen in nodules on its roots. Its wood is very hard and is used as a building material and as firewood. The bark is widely used in traditional medicines.
COCONUT TREE
Coconut Palm Cocos nucifera HABIT
Woody perennial
The Coconut Palm can live as long as 100 years, a mature tree producing 50–80 coconuts a year. The trunk is ringed with annual scars left by fallen leaf bases.
66–72 ft (20–22 m)
HEIGHT
Coastal rocky, sandy, and, coralline soils
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and subtropical coasts
worldwide
The coconut palm was once the mainstay of life on Pacific islands. It provided food, drink, fuel, medicine, lumber, mats, domestic utensils, and thatching for roofs. It remains an important subsistence crop on many Pacific islands today. Its original habitat was sandy coasts around the Indo-Malayan region, but it now is found over a much wider area, assisted by its natural dispersal mechanism, and deliberate planting by humans. The fibrous husk of the coconut fruit is a flotation aid that enables the seeds to be carried vast distances by ocean waves and currents. The coconut palm cannot develop viable fruits outside of the tropics and subtropics. COCONUT FRUIT
The fruit of the coconut palm weighs 2¼– 4½ lb (1–2 kg). It contains one seed, which is rich in food reserves and is part solid (flesh) and part liquid (coconut milk).
fibrous husk
OCEAN LIFE
edible flesh
256
fungi
FUNGI and filamentous life-forms, including yeasts and molds. Some organize their filaments KINGDOM Fungi into complex fruiting structures, such as mushrooms. Truly marine fungi PHYLA 4 are rare, but a few funguslike organisms survive within a slime covering, SPECIES 600,000 avoiding contact with salt water. Fungi are abundant on shorelines, but only in close association with certain algae. Alga and fungus grow in partnership in a kind of symbiotic, compound organism called a lichen. Lichens proliferate in the hostile, wave-splashed zone of bare rock just above high tide. DOMAIN Eucarya
FUNGI FORM A GREAT KINGDOM OF SINGLE-CELLED
ANATOMY A lichen’s body (thallus) is composed mainly of fungal filaments called hyphae. The cells of the fungus’s algal partner are restricted to a thin layer below the surface, where they cannot dry out. Lichens grow in one of four ways: bushy (fruticose); leaflike (foliose); tightly clustered (squamulose); or lying flat (crustose). Marine funguslike organisms, such as slime nets (labyrinthulids) and thraustochytrids, are microscopic, usually transparent, and encased in a network of slimy threads. The cells move up and down within the threads and react positively toward food. They are increasingly recognized as protists, however, rather than fungi. LICHEN COMPOSITION
This false-color micrograph of a lichen (below) shows the smooth surface of the thallus, to the left, and fungal hyphae, to the right.
ENCASED IN SLIME
This thraustochytrid (above) is a funguslike organism that lives as a parasite within certain bivalves. Its slime net forms a complete cover.
OCEAN LIFE
HABITATS Most lichens require alternating dry and wet periods, but marine lichens can withstand continuous drought or dampness. On most rocky shores, yellow and gray lichens dominate surfaces splashed by waves at high tide (the splash zone). They endure both the drying sun and wind, and the salt spray of the sea. Below, in the tidal zone, the brightly colored lichens give way to black encrusting lichen, such as Verrucaria maura, which covers the bedrock and any large, stable boulders. Verrucaria serpuloides lives yet farther down the shore and is the only lichen to survive permanent immersion in sea water. Slime nets can live in the sea because they are protected from the dehydrating effects of salt water by slime, or because they live as parasites within seagrasses, green algae, or clams. BELOW THE SPLASH ZONE
Some lichens, such as this crustose black Verrucaria, live below the splash zone, and may be surrounded by seaweeds.
LICHEN ENCRUSTATION
Fungi thrive on the coast if they grow in association with algae, in an intimate symbiosis called lichen. Here, encrusting and foliose lichens cover sandstone cliffs in the Shetland Isles, Scotland.
257 PHYLUM ASCOMYCOTA
Sea Ivory
PHYLUM ASCOMYCOTA
Yellow Splash Lichen
Ramalina siliquosa
Xanthoria parietina WIDTH
LENGTH (BRANCHES)
1–4 in (2–10 cm)
Up to 4 in (10 cm)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Splash zone; favors surfaces high in nitrogenous compounds
Hard siliceous rocks above the splash zone DISTRIBUTION Northeast and southwest Atlantic, coasts of Japan and New Zealand
DISTRIBUTION
Nutrient-poor siliceous rocks are the favorite habitat of gray lichens, such as sea ivory. This lichen is usually graygreen in color, with a brittle, bushlike (fruticose) structure and disk-shaped fruiting bodies, called apothecia, at its branch tips. Sea ivory cannot withstand being trampled or extensively grazed, and so it grows best on vertical rock faces, to which it sticks by a single basal attachment.
On most rocky shores, different species of lichen have a marked vertical territory related to their tolerance of salt exposure. The yellow splash lichen is found in the splash zone and forms a bright orange band across the shore, with gray lichens above it and black lichens below. It has a leaflike (foliose) form, with slow-growing, leafy lobes held more or less parallel to the rock on which it lives. Usually bright orange in color, it tends to become greener if in shade. Lichens are widely used to monitor air pollution because they simply disappear when conditions deteriorate. The yellow splash lichen is particularly sensitive to sulfur dioxide, a by-product of industrial processes and of burning fossil fuels.
Temperate Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico, Indian and Pacific oceans
PHYLUM ASCOMYCOTA
Black Tar Lichen PHYLUM ASCOMYCOTA
Verrucaria maura THICKNESS
Black Shields
1/32
in (1 mm)
HABITAT
Tephromela atra
Intertidal WIDTH
Up to 4 in (10 cm) HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
In and above the splash zone
Ocean, Japan
Temperate and polar coasts, Indian
This smooth, black, crustose lichen covers large areas of bedrock or stable boulders in a thin layer, making them appear as though they have been covered with dull black paint. Many types of lichen accumulate heavy metals, and the black tar lichen is no exception, having been found to have levels of iron that are about 2.5 million times more concentrated than the surrounding seawater. That may be an adaptation to deter grazers, such as gastropods, from eating it.
PHYLUM ASCOMYCOTA
Gray Lichen Pyrenocollema halodytes SIZE
Not recorded HABITAT
Upper shore on rocks and on shells of some sedentary invertebrates DISTRIBUTION
Temperate northeast and southwest
Atlantic
Seen on hard, calcareous rocks, where it forms small, black-brown patches, gray lichen is unusual in being an association of three organisms— a fungus, a cyanobacteria, and an alga. The fungus anchors the lichen to the rock; the cyanobacteria and the alga contain chlorophyll and make food by photosynthesis. The cyanobacteria can also utilize nitrogen, a process that uses a lot of energy, and this comes from the sugar made during photosynthesis.
Polar coasts, coast of California, US, Gulf of Mexico, Mediterranean, Indian Ocean DISTRIBUTION
Crustose lichens such as black shields, which form a crust over the rock, attach themselves so firmly using fungal filaments that they cannot be easily removed from it. Over time, these anchoring filaments break down the rock as they alternately shrink when dry and swell when moist. Black shields is a thick, gray lichen with a rough, often cracked, surface from which project a number of characteristic black fruiting bodies. PHYLUM ASCOMYCOTA
Black Tufted Lichen WIDTH (LOBES)
To 1/2 in (1.5 cm) HABITAT
Lower littoral fringe to middle shore, regularly covered by the tide Northeast Atlantic from Norway to northwest Africa
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Lichina pygmaea
Typically found on exposed sunny rock faces, this lichen looks rather like a seaweed, being fruticose (bushlike) in form with branching, brownish black, flattened lobes. Its fruiting bodies form in small swellings at its branch tips. It is often seen growing in association with barnacles but does not tolerate algal (seaweed) growth. Its compact growth and rigid branches provide a refuge for several mollusks, particularly Lasaea rubra, a small, pinkshelled gastropod. All Lichina species are limited to coastal habitats.
258
animal life
ANIMAL LIFE ANIMAL LIFE FIRST APPEARED IN THE OCEAN over one billion years ago. It has since diversified into a vast KINGDOM Animalia array of different organisms. The range of scale among PHYLA About 30 marine animals is immense: the smallest invertebrates SPECIES More than 1.5 million are over half a million times smaller than the largest whales. Despite this huge disparity, animals all share two key features. First, they are heterotrophs, meaning they obtain energy from food. Second, they are multicellular, which distinguishes them from single-celled life forms. DOMAIN Eucarya
MARINE ANIMAL DIVERSITY
CHANGING SHAPE
Most invertebrates change shape as they develop. Feather stars start as drifting larvae, which eventually attach themselves to corals or rock before changing into swimming adults.
Animals are classified into 30 or more major groups (phyla), all of which include at least some marine animals. Twenty-nine of these phyla are composed of animals without backbones (invertebrates), each phylum representing a completely different body plan. Only one phylum, the chordates, contains animals with backbones (vertebrates). In salt water, vertebrates include fish, reptiles, birds, and mammals— animals that are often described as the dominant forms of ocean life. However, in terms of abundance and diversity, invertebrates have a stronger claim to this title. Invertebrates exist in all ocean VERTEBRATE habitats and outnumber marine Active predators, such vertebrates by a million to one. as this barracuda, need sharp senses and rapid They include an array of fixed reactions to catch prey. (sessile) animals, such as corals and Unlike invertebrates, sponges. They also form most of the they have fast-acting zooplankton, a drifting community nerves and wellof animals and animal-like protists. developed brains.
INVERTEBRATE
This yellow tube sponge, from the sea off Belize, is a typical sessile invertebrate. Instead of moving to find food, it filters out particles of food by pumping water through its pores.
SUPPORT AND BUOYANCY On land, most animals have hard skeletons to counteract gravity’s pull. Life is different in the sea, because water is denser than air. It buoys up soft-bodied animals, such as jellyfish, enabling them to grow large. They use internal pressure to keep their shape, the same principle that works in balloons. Animals with hard body parts, such as fish and mollusks, are often denser than water, and would naturally sink. To combat this, many have a buoyancy device. Bony BUBBLE RAFT The violet sea snail fishes have an adjustable gas-filled swim bladder, stays afloat by producing while squid have an internal float made of chalky bubbles of mucus. material, containing many gas-filled spaces. Some The mucus slowly surface dwellers, such as the violet sea snail, have hardens, forming a permanent raft. gas-filled floats that prevent them from sinking.
OCEAN LIFE
GROUPS AND INDIVIDUALS Among marine animals, there is a social spectrum from species that live on their own to those that form permanent groups. The whale shark is a typical solitary species, spending its entire life on its own apart from when it breeds. It can do this because its huge size means it has few natural predators. Smaller fish often form shoals, which reduce each fish’s chances of being singled out for attack. Many invertebrates, from corals to tunicates, live in permanent groups, known as colonies. In most coral colonies, the individual animals, or polyps, are anatomically identical and function as independent SAFETY IN units, even though they are joined. NUMBERS Crowded together Other animal colonies, such as the Portuguese man-of-war, are made of in a ball, gregarious striped catfish individuals with distinct forms. Each (right) make a form carries out a different task, like confusing target for predators. parts of a single animal.
COLONY ON THE MOVE
LONE GIANT
A diver films a pyrosome colony in the sea off Florida. It consists of thousands of tiny soft-bodied animals called tunicates, joined together to form a tube.
The whale shark (below) is a solitary species with a pantropical range. It only congregates in particular regions during the breeding season.
animal life
REPRODUCTION Animals reproduce in two ways. In asexual reproduction, which occurs in many marine animals from flatworms to sea anemones, a single parent divides in two, or grows (buds off) parts that become independent. In sexual reproduction, the eggs of one parent are fertilized by the sperm of another. Sessile animals, such as corals and clams, usually breed sexually by shedding their eggs and sperm into the water, leaving them to meet by chance. In some fish, all mammals, and birds, fertilization is internal, which means that the two parents have to mate. Marine animals vary greatly in reproductive potential. Most whales have a single calf each time they breed, but an ocean sunfish can produce over 300 million eggs a year. COURTSHIP
Two waved albatrosses display to each other in the Galápagos Islands. Complex courtship rituals like this ensure that each parent finds a partner of the right species and the right sex, and they cement the bond once breeding begins.
259
SINGLE PARENT
This sea anemone is budding off young that will eventually take up life on their own. Asexual reproduction is quick and simple, but it does not produce genetic variation, making it more difficult for a species to adapt to change. SEA SYMPHONY
A wrasse feeds among coral in the Red Sea. Coral reefs contain the greatest diversity of animal life in the oceans, and are one of the few habitats that are actually created by animals.
OCEAN LIFE
260
animal life
SPONGES
osculum
ANATOMY
diverse group DOMAIN Eucarya of often colorful invertebrates lives KINGDOM Animalia permanently attached to the sea floor. PHYLUM Porifera Naturalists once thought they were CLASSES 3 plants, but they are now known to be very simple animals with no close SPECIES About 15,000 relatives. Sponges live by drawing water into their bodies through tiny holes called pores, filtering it for food and oxygen and pushing it out again. Many species are found on coral reefs or rocks, and a few live in fresh water. THIS ABUNDANT AND
The body plan of a sponge is based on a system of water canals lined with special cells known as collar cells. Collar cells are unique to sponges. They draw water into the sponge through pores, by each beating a long, whiplike flagellum. A ring of tiny tentacles around the base of the flagellum traps food particles, and the water and waste material then flows out of the sponge through larger openings. Rigidity is provided by a skeleton made up of tiny splinters (spicules) of silicon dioxide or calcium carbonate scattered throughout the body.
HABITATS Most sponges need a hard surface for attachment, but some can live in soft sediment; a few species are able to bore into rocks and shells. Sponges are common on rocky reefs, shipwrecks, and coral reefs in a wide range of temperatures and depths. The largest populations occur where there are strong tidal currents, which bring extra food. Animals such as crabs and worms sometimes live inside sponges, but little manages to settle and grow on their surface. This is because sponges produce chemicals to discourage predators.
central cavity collar cell flagellum spicule
pore
BODY SECTION
A sponge has specialized cells, but no organs. Water enters the sponge through hollow pore cells and exits via larger openings called osculae.
CHANGING SHAPE
Many sponges grow different shapes in different habitats. This sponge develops fingers in strong currents (above), but has an encrusting form (right) when it grows in wave-exposed sites.
VARIETY OF FORM
Sponges come in many forms, including tubes, spheres, and threadlike shapes. Pictured are a brown tube sponge and an irregular deep red sponge.
CLASS DEMOSPONGIAE
Barrel Sponge Xestospongia testudinaria HEIGHT
Up to 6 ft (2 m) DEPTH
6–165 ft (2–50 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Pacific
CLASS HEXACTINELLIDA
OCEAN LIFE
Reef-forming Sponge Heterochone calyx Up to 5 ft (1.5 m)
HEIGHT
300–800 ft (100–250 m)
DEPTH
HABITAT
Deep hard
seabed DISTRIBUTION
Deep cold waters of north Pacific
The reef-forming sponge not only looks like a delicate glass vase, but its skeleton spicules are made from the same material as glass, silica. Each spicule has six rays, hence the Latin name of its class, Hexactinellida. Many glass sponges grow very large—off Canada’s British Columbian coast, the reef-forming sponge forms huge mounds nearly 65 ft (20 m) high spread over several miles. Other members of their class also contribute to these reefs, which may have started forming nearly 9,000 years ago. Like coral reefs, sponge reefs provide a home for many other animals.
Tropical waters of western
These gigantic sponges grow large enough to fit a person inside. Their hard surface is deeply ridged, but their rim is thin and delicate. The barrel sponge belongs to the Demospongiae, the largest class of sponges, containing about 95 percent of sponge species. The skeleton of sponges in this class is made from both scattered spicules of silica and organic collagen called spongin. An almost identical barrel sponge, Xestospongia muta, occurs in the Caribbean.
261 CLASS DEMOSPONGIAE
Blue Sponge Adocia species SIZE (LENGTH)
Up to
31/4 ft (1 m) DEPTH
Shallow water
HABITAT
Steep coral
reefs Tropical waters off coast of northern Borneo
DISTRIBUTION
CLASS DEMOSPONGIAE
Breadcrumb Sponge Halichondria panicea WIDTH To more than 12 in (30 cm)
Shore to sublittoral zone
DEPTH
HABITAT
Hard surfaces
DISTRIBUTION Temperate coastal waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
The appearance of this soft encrusting sponge varies from thin sheets to thick crusts and large lumps. On waveexposed shores, it usually grows under ledges as a thin, green crust, its osculae opening at the tops of small mounds. Its green color is produced by photosynthetic pigments in symbiotic algae in the sponge’s tissues. In deeper, shaded waters, the sponge is usually a creamy yellow. In waters with strong currents, this sponge may cover large rocky areas and kelp stems.
The exact identity of this beautiful, bright blue sponge has not yet been ascertained. It is soft and spongy in texture and grows in irregular branches with a row of large, round osculae running along each branch. It is especially common on the tops of prominent corals and rocks and on steep, shaded reef areas. This and many other tropical sponges are recognized as distinct species but have not yet been formally described and named. The dorid sea slug (Jorunna funebris) feeds on this sponge.
CLASS DEMOSPONGIAE
Tube Sponge Kallypilidion fascigera HEIGHT
Up to 3 ft (1 m) DEPTH
Below 33 ft (10 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs Tropical reef waters of western Pacific; likely to be more widespread than shown
DISTRIBUTION
The elegant, tubular branches of this beautiful sponge are easily torn, and so it occurs only on deeper reef slopes, where wave action is minimal.
CLASS DEMOSPONGIAE
It sometimes grows as a single tube, but it is more often seen as bunches of tubes joined at the base. The tips of the tubes are translucent and slightly rolled in. The color of this sponge is usually pinkish violet, although some specimens are pinkish blue. When this sponge releases sperm, it resembles smoking chimneys. The taxonomic status of this species and its relationship to other species in the same family has not been fully determined, and it is listed under various names in different sources. Such uncertainties are not unusual in the study of sponges and mean that the exact distribution of this many other species is yet to be established.
CLASS SCLEROSPONGIAE
Mediterranean Bath Sponge
Coralline Sponge Vaceletia ospreyensis
Spongia officinalis adriatica
SIZE
Not recorded
WIDTH
DEPTH
Up to 14 in (35 cm)
At least 65 ft (20 m)
DEPTH
HABITAT
3–165 ft (1–50 m)
Dark reef caves
HABITAT
Not fully known, but includes tropical waters of western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Rocks DISTRIBUTION
Mediterranean, especially the
eastern part
CLASS CALCAREA
Lemon Sponge Leucetta chagosensis WIDTH Up to 8 in (20 cm) DEPTH
Shallow
Steep coral reef and rock slopes
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical reef waters of western
Pacific
The lemon sponge is a beautiful, bright yellow color and is easy to spot underwater. It grows in the form of sacs, which may have an irregular,
OCEAN LIFE
The Mediterranean bath sponge, as its name suggests, is collected and processed for use as a bath sponge. It grows as rounded cushions and mounds, and is usually dull gray to black outside but yellowish white inside. It can be used as a sponge because it has no sharp skeletal spicules, just a network of tough fibers made from an elastic material called spongin. Huge numbers were once harvested, but today they are rare.
lobed shape. Each sac has a large opening—the osculum—through which used water flows out of the sponge. Through the osculum, entrances to the water-intake channels that run throughout the sponge can be seen. The lemon sponge belongs to a small class of sponges in which the mineral skeleton is composed entirely of calcium carbonate spicules, most of which have three or four rays. The densely packed spicules give the sponge a solid texture. Like all sponges, this sponge is hermaphroditic. It incubates its eggs inside and releases them as live larvae through the osculum. Each larva is a hollow ball of cells with flagellae for swimming.
Vaceletia ospreyensis is a living member of the coralline sponges group, most of which are known only from fossils. Coralline sponges have a massive skeleton made of calcium carbonate, as well as silica spicules and organic fibers. They were the dominant reefbuilding organisms before the stony corals of modern reefs evolved. Although given a separate class here, the Sclerospongiae, it is quite possible that coralline sponges belong to the class Demospongiae.
262
animal life
CNIDARIANS
HUMAN IMPACT
emerged in Precambrian times, about 600 million years ago. It includes KINGDOM Animalia reef-building corals, anemones, jellyfish, and hydroids, most PHYLUM Cnidaria of which are marine. Cnidarians have a radially symmetrical CLASSES 4 body shaped like a simple sac, with stinging tentacles around a SPECIES 8,000–9,000 single opening that serves as both mouth and anus. There are two body forms: the polyp form, typified by sea anemones, which is fixed to a solid surface and has an upward-facing mouth and tentacles; and the medusa, shown by adult jellyfish, which can swim and has a downward-facing mouth and tentacles.
-ANYCORALSAREHARVESTEDFORSALE ASSOUVENIRS ANDTHEMOSTVALUED SPECIESAREBEINGOVERCOLLECTED 0ARTICULARLYDESIRABLEARECERTAIN SOFTCORALS INWHICHTHECALCAREOUS SUPPORTINGCOLUMNISSOSTRONG ANDDENSEITCANBECARVEDAND POLISHED4HEYINCLUDETHEREDOR PRECIOUSCORAL Corallium rubrum WHICHISMADEINTOTRINKETSAND BEADEDNECKLACESBELOW "LACK CORALSORDER!NTIPATHARIA ALSO HAVESTRONGSKELETONSTHATCANBE CARVED ANDFORTUNE SEEKING DIVERSSOMETIMESTAKEGREATRISKS TOGATHERTHESEDEEP WATERSPECIES
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THIS ANCIENT GROUP OF AQUATIC ANIMALS
DOMAIN Eucarya
ANATOMY Corals and anemones exist only as polyps, whereas other cnidarians can be either polyps or medusae at different stages of their life cycle. The body wall of both polyps and medusae consists of two types of tissue. On the outside is the epidermis, which acts like a skin to protect the animal. The inner tissue layer, lining the body cavity, is the gastrodermis, which carries out digestion and produces reproductive cells. Separating and connecting these two layers is a jellylike substance called the mesoglea. The tentacles have stinging cells called cnidocytes, which are unique to this phylum and give it its name. A simple nervous system responds to touch, chemicals, and temperature.
TENTACLE ARRANGEMENT
The number of tentacles on coral polyps varies from one group to another. The polyps of all soft corals (above) have eight tentacles, hence their alternative name of octocorals. Hexacorals (right) have tentacles arranged in multiples of six. POLYP tentacle
POLYP AND MEDUSA
epidermis
mesoglea gastrodermis
Polyps are essentially gut cnidocyte a tube, closed at one epidermis end, that attaches to a mouth mesoglea hard surface by a basal shelf of gastrodermis disk. They live singly or muscle (velum) in colonies. Medusae budding are bell-shaped and juvenile usually have a thicker gut mesoglea; some also have a shelf of muscle basal tentacle for locomotion. disk MEDUSA epidermal cell coiled thread nematocyst
BEFORE DISCHARGE
barbs
uncoiled hollow thread
AFTER DISCHARGE
STINGING CELLS
Each cnidocyte contains a bulblike structure, called a nematocyst, which houses a coiled, barbed thread. When triggered by touch or chemicals, the thread explodes outward and pierces the prey’s skin. The animal’s tentacles are then used to haul the victim in.
OCEAN LIFE
SCLERITES
Small slivers of calcium carbonate called sclerites are scattered through the tissues of soft corals and sea fans. Here, they are visible as white shards under the colony’s skin.
BUILDING REEFS
Coral reefs are built by colonies of coral polyps that secrete a hard exoskeleton of calcium carbonate. As the tiny polyps divide and grow, the reef expands.
cnidarians
LOCOMOTION
REPRODUCTION
The most mobile cnidarians are free-living jellyfish and medusae, which mainly drift in water currents but also swim actively using a form of jet propulsion. Most colonial cnidarians, such as corals and sea fans, cannot move from place to place. However, they can expand and contract their polyps to feed or escape danger, and some sea pens can withdraw the whole colony below the surface of the sediment in which they live. Unattached mushroom corals may move JELLYFISH SWIMMING slowly, or even right themselves if A jellyfish swims by using muscles overturned. Anemones can creep slowly to contract its bell, forcing water out over the sea bed on their muscular basal and pushing it along. The muscles disk, and a few species swim if attacked. then relax and the bell opens again.
Members of the class Anthozoa, such as corals and anemones, reproduce by asexual budding. A genetically identical copy of the adult grows on the polyp’s body wall. This budding juvenile drops off or stays attached to form a colony. Anthozoans also reproduce sexually, producing eggs and sperm within the polyps. Fertilized eggs develop into hairy, oval larvae (planulae), which either swim free or are brooded internally and then released. Hydrozoans have a two-stage life cycle. Their polyps release tiny free-swimming medusae into the water which, when mature, shed eggs and sperm. The resulting fertilized eggs develop into planulae that settle in a new area to grow into polyps. In contrast, the medusa form of jellyfish is usually much larger than the fixed polyp form and the polyps bud asexually.
263
BUDDING JELLYFISH POLYPS
bell relaxed and flattened, ready to propel forward
bell begins to contract and force water out
Jellyfish polyps are minuscule, and their sole function is to reproduce asexually by budding off baby jellyfish.
bell fully contracted, with little water remaining inside
ZOOXANTHELLAE The massive skeletons secreted by reef-building corals require energy for their construction. Corals cannot catch enough plankton in clear tropical waters to provide this energy. Instead, they rely on tiny, symbiotic single-celled algae, called zooxanthellae, living in their cells. These algae manufacture organic matter by photosynthesis, and make more food than they need, so the excess is used by the coral. The algae benefit from a safe place to live and obtain “fertilizer” from the coral by using its nitrogenous waste products. If stressed by disease or high temperatures, corals expel their zooxanthellae, in a process called coral bleaching, and may die of starvation.
ZOOXANTHELLAE
Reef corals have mainly colorless polyps and white skeletons—it is the tiny zooxanthellae living in their tissues that gives the corals their color.
CNIDARIAN CLASSIFICATION Cnidarians are divided into four classes and a large number of orders and families. This phylum used to be called the Coelenterata, a name still used by some authorities. Many species remain undescribed. ANTHOZOANS Anthozoa
JELLYFISH Scyphozoa
About 6,000 species
About 200 species
These colonial or solitary polyps are diverse in shape and have no medusa phase. Octocorals (soft corals, sea fans, and sea pens) have polyps with eight feathery tentacles; hexacorals (including hard corals and anemones) have polyps with multiples of six simple tentacles; ceriantipatharians have polyps with unbranched tentacles.
These mostly free-swimming medusae are shaped like a bell or saucer with a fringe of stinging tentacles. The edges of the mouth, located on the underside, are drawn out to form trailing mouth tentacles or oral arms. BOX JELLYFISH Cubozoa About 16 species
These jellyfish have a cube-shaped bell with four flattened sides and a domed top. There are four tentacles or clusters of tentacles, one at each corner. Most are virulent stingers.
About 2,700 species
RED SEA FAN Paracis species
These colonial cnidarians mostly resemble plant growths attached to the seabed. A few have hard skeletons and resemble corals, and some colonies float at the surface like jellyfish. Most species have a free-living medusa stage.
OCEAN LIFE
HYDROIDS Hydrozoa
264 CLASS HYDROZOA
Blue Buttons Porpita porpita DIAMETER 3/ in 4
(2 cm)
DEPTH
Surface HABITAT
Surface waters DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide in warm waters
At first sight, blue buttons could be mistaken for a small jellyfish or even a piece of blue plastic. In fact, it is a hydrozoan colony that is modified for a free-floating existence. Swarms of these unusual creatures can be seen drifting on the water’s surface or can sometimes be found washed up on the shore. The animal is kept afloat by a buoyant circular disk. Around the edge hang protective stinging polyps modified as knobbed tentacles. In the center underneath hangs a large feeding polyp that acts as the mouth for the whole colony. In between this and the tentacles are circlets of reproductive polyps. Unlike the Portuguese man-of-war (see p.214) to which it is related, blue buttons do not have a powerful sting.
CLASS HYDROZOA
Stinging Hydroid Aglaophenia cupressina Up to 16 in
HEIGHT
(40 cm) 10–100 ft (3–30 m)
DEPTH
HABITAT
around among the corals on a reef. Individual polyps are arranged along one side of the smallest branches and extend their stinging tentacles to catch small planktonic animals. The sting is not usually dangerous to humans, but it results in an itchy rash that can irritate for up to a week.
CLASS SCYPHOZOA
CLASS SCYPHOZOA
Deep-sea Jellyfish
Moon Jellyfish
Periphylla periphylla
Aurelia aurita
8–14 in (20–35 cm)
HEIGHT
DIAMETER
Up to 12 in (30 cm)
3,000–23,000 ft (900–7,000 m)
DEPTH
Coral reefs
HABITAT
DEPTH
Near surface
Open water
HABITAT
Open water DISTRIBUTION
While most hydroids are harmless to touch, the stinging hydroid has a powerful sting. The colonies look like clumps of feathers or ferns dotted
This jellyfish belongs to a group called coronate jellyfish, which are shaped like a ballet tutu. The upper part of the bell is a tall, stiff cone and the lower part a wider, soft, crown-shaped base with a scalloped edge. The 12 thin tentacles are often held in an upright position. The insides of the deep-sea jellyfish are a deep red color, and this may hide the bioluminescent light given out by its ingested prey. The jellyfish itself can squirt out a bioluminescent secretion that may help to confuse any predators. Unlike many jellyfish, the deep-sea jellyfish does not develop from a fixed bottom-living stage.
CLASS SCYPHOZOA
Stalked Jellyfish Haliclystus auricula HEIGHT
Up to 2 in (5 cm) DEPTH
0–50 ft (0–15 m)
HABITAT
On seaweed or
seagrass DISTRIBUTION
north Pacific
OCEAN LIFE
Deep water worldwide, except
Tropical reefs in Indian Ocean and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Coastal waters of north Atlantic and
DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide; polar distribution unknown
Arctic Ocean
Most jellyfish drift and swim freely in the water, but stalked jellyfish spend their lives attached by a stalk to vegetation. The body of the jellyfish is shaped like a tiny funnel made up of eight equally spaced arms joined together by a membrane. Each arm ends in a cluster of tentacles on the funnel rim, and between each of these clusters is an extra anchorshaped tentacle. This animal cannot swim, but it can move by bending over on its stalk and turning “headover-heels,” using the anchor tentacles to fix itself temporarily to the sea bed as it flips over and then reattaches its adhesive disk. Stalked jellyfish can be found attached to seaweed or seagrass in the intertidal zone and shallow water, where they feed by catching prey, such as small shrimp and fish fry, with their tentacles and passing it to the mouth inside the funnel. Undigested remains are expelled from the mouth.
tentacle held upright
scalloped edge of bell
The moon jellyfish is possibly the most widespread of all jellyfish and can be found in almost every part of the ocean except for very cold waters. It exists mainly in coastal waters and is sometimes cast ashore in large numbers because it is not a strong swimmer and lives near the surface. The body is shaped like a saucer with a fringe of fine, short tentacles, which it uses to catch plankton. It can also trap plankton in sticky mucus on its bell and slide this down into its mouth on the underside. The gonads show through the translucent bell as four opaque horseshoe shapes.
cnidarians
265
gonads
stinging tentacle
frilly mouth lobe
CLASS SCYPHOZOA
Mauve Stinger Pelagia noctiluca DIAMETER
Up to 5 in (13 cm) DEPTH
Near surface HABITAT
Open water
This jellyfish produces bioluminescent light shows, which are often admired from passing boats, but it also has a reputation as a ferocious stinger. As well as having eight stinging tentacles, it is covered in tiny red spots that are bundles of stinging cells. The sting is painful but not dangerous. The mauve
OCEAN LIFE
Northeastern Atlantic, Mediterranean, Indian Ocean, and western and central Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
stinger glows by producing luminous mucus from surface cells when it is knocked or disturbed by waves. Hanging down from the underside of the mushroom-shaped bell are four long, frilly mouth lobes, which are sometimes called oral arms. These also have stinging cells that paralyze and entangle small planktonic animals. Sticky mucus holds the prey, which is then passed up grooves in the arms and into the mouth. Unlike most jellyfish, the life cycle of the mauve stinger does not involve a fixed stage. Eggs and sperm are shed into the water, where the eggs are fertilized and develop into tiny, oval planula larvae covered in hairlike cilia. The planula larva changes directly into a tiny, lobed, saucer-shaped medusa called an ephyra, which gradually develops into an adult.
266
animal life CLASS SCYPHOZOA
Upside-down Jellyfish Cassiopeia xamachana DIAMETER
Up to 12 in
(30 cm) DEPTH
0–33 ft (0–10 m)
Coastal mangroves
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of Gulf of Mexico and
Caribbean
Divers who find this jellyfish upsidedown on the seabed often think they have found a dying specimen. However, the upside-down jellyfish lives like this, floating with its bell pointing downward and its eight large,
branching mouth arms held upward. The mouth arms have elaborate fringes consisting of tiny bladders filled with minute single-celled algae called zooxanthellae. The algae need light to photosynthesize, and the jellyfish behaves as it does in order to ensure its passengers can thrive. Excess food manufactured by the algae is used by the jellyfish, but it can also catch planktonic animals with stinging cells on the mouth arms. Its bell pulsates to create water currents that bring food and oxygen. When it wants to move, the upside-down jellyfish turns the right way up with the bell uppermost. A very similar jellyfish, Cassiopeia andromeda, is found in the tropical Indian and Pacific Oceans and may actually be the same species.
CLASS CUBOZOA
Box Jellyfish Chironex fleckeri DIAMETER
Up to 10 in (25 cm) DEPTH
Near surface HABITAT
Open water Tropical waters of southwest Pacific and eastern Indian Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
A sting from the box jellyfish can kill a person in only a few minutes, and this small animal is considered one of the most venomous in the ocean. At each corner of its box-shaped, transparent body is a bunch of 15 tentacles. When it is hunting prey such as shrimp and small fish in shallow water, the tentacles extend up to 10 ft (3 m), and swimmers can be stung without ever seeing the jellyfish. In the middle of each flattened side is a collection of sense organs including some remarkably complex eyes. The exact range of this jellyfish in the Indo-Pacific region north of Australia is not known, but other smaller, less dangerous box jellyfish also occur in the Indian and Pacific oceans. Some sea turtles can eat the box jellyfish without being affected by its sting. HUMAN IMPACT
,%4(!,6%./4HESTINGOFABOXJELLYFISHCAUSES EXCRUCIATINGPAINANDSKIN DAMAGEANDCANLEAVEPERMANENT SCARS)NSEVERECASES DEATHMAY OCCURFROMHEARTFAILUREOR DROWNINGFOLLOWINGLOSSOF CONSCIOUSNESS!BOXJELLYFISH ANTIVENINISAVAILABLEIN!USTRALIA )NNORTHERNPARTSOFTHECOUNTRY SOMEBEACHESARECLOSEDTOTHE PUBLICFORPERIODSBETWEEN .OVEMBERAND!PRILWHENTHE JELLYFISHAREMOSTABUNDANT
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Organ Pipe Coral Tubipora musica DIAMETER
Up to 20 in (50 cm) DEPTH
15–65 ft (5–20 m) HABITAT
Tropical reefs Tropical reefs of Indian Ocean and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Mushroom Leather Coral
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Dead Man’s Fingers Alcyonium digitatum
Sarcophyton species
HEIGHT
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
DIAMETER
DEPTH
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m)
0–165 ft (0–50 m)
DEPTH
HABITAT
0–165 ft (0–50 m) HABITAT
Rocks and reefs Tropical waters of Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and western and central Pacific
Rocks and wrecks Temperate and cold waters of northeastern Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
This distinctive soft coral has a conspicuous bare stalk topped by a wide, fleshy cap covered in polyps. When the colony is touched or is resting, the polyps are withdrawn into the fleshy body, and it looks and feels like leather. Within this genus there are many similar species.
This soft coral’s strange name comes from its appearance when thrown ashore by storms. It is shaped like a thick lump with stubby fingers, which can, with a little imagination, resemble a corpse’s hand. When alive, it grows attached to rocks in shallow water and often covers large areas, especially where strong currents bring plenty of planktonic
Although the organ pipe coral has a hard skeleton, it is not a true stony coral. Instead, it belongs in the group of cnidarians that includes soft corals and sea fans. Its beautiful red skeleton is made up of parallel tubes joined by horizontal links, and bits of this animal’s skeleton are often found washed up on tropical shores. A single polyp extends from the end of each tube, and when the polyps expand their eight branched tentacles to feed, the skeleton cannot be seen. food. With the polyps extended, the colonies have a soft, furry look. Most dead man’s fingers colonies are white but some, like those shown below, are orange with white polyps. Over the fall and winter, the colony retracts its polyps and becomes dormant. In the spring, the outer skin is shed, along with any algae and other organisms that have settled on it.
cnidarians
267
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Carnation Coral Dendronephthya species HEIGHT
Up to 12 in (30 cm) DEPTH
33–165 ft (10–50 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs Tropical reefs of Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Carnation corals are among the most colorful of all reef animals. They grow as branched and bushy colonies and often cover steep reef walls with pink, red, orange, yellow, and white patches. They prefer to live where there are fast currents. When the current is running, they expand to full size and the polyps, which are on the branch ends, extend out to feed. With little or no current, they often hang down as flaccid lumps. In some species, such as the one shown here, small slivers of colored calcium carbonate show through the body tissue. These are called sclerites and help to give the soft branches some strength. Individual species of Dendronephthya are difficult to identify visually and many species have not yet been described.
CLASS ANTHOZOA
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Pulse Coral
Common Sea Fan
Xenia species
Gorgonia ventalina HEIGHT
HEIGHT
Up to 2 in (5 cm)
Up to 6 ft (2 m)
DEPTH
DEPTH
15–165 ft (5–50 m)
15–65 ft (5–20 m)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Coral reefs Tropical reefs of the Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and western Pacific DISTRIBUTION
Coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Caribbean Sea
Sea fans grow attached to the seabed and look like exotic plants. Unlike soft corals, they have a supporting skeleton that provides a framework and allows them to grow quite large. It is made mainly of a flexible, horny material
CLASS ANTHOZOA
White Sea Whip Junceella fragilis HEIGHT
Up to 6 ft (2 m) DEPTH
15–165 ft (5–50 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Southwestern Pacific
Sea whips have a very similar structure to sea fans but grow up as a single tall stem. They have a very strong central supporting rod containing a lot of calcareous material as well as a flexible, horny material called gorgonin. The small polyps have eight tentacles and are placed all around the stem. White sea whips are often found in groups because they can reproduce asexually. As the whip enlarges, the fragile tip breaks off and drops onto the seabed, where it attaches and grows.
OCEAN LIFE
The most notable feature of this soft coral is the way the feathery tentacles of the polyps rapidly and continually open and close. A reef covered in fastpulse coral is alive with movement. The colonies have a stout trunk with a dome-shaped top covered with long polyps. Unlike mushroom leather coral (see opposite), pulse coral polyps cannot retract and disappear. The pulsating movements of the polyps may help to oxygenate the colony as well as bring food within range of their tentacles.
called gorgonin and consists of a rod that extends down the inside of all except the smallest branches. In the common sea fan, the branches are mostly in one plane and form a mesh that is aligned at right angles to the prevailing current. This increases the amount of planktonic food brought within reach of the polyps, which are arranged all around the branches. Fishing nets dragged over the reef can damage common sea fans and, as they grow quite slowly, they take a long time to recolonize. They are also collected, dried, and sold as souvenirs.
268
animal life
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Mediterranean Red Coral Corallium rubrum HEIGHT
Up to 20 in
(50 cm) 165–650 ft (50–200 m)
DEPTH
its name, it is not a true stony coral but instead is in the same group as sea fans (see p.267). Like them, its branches are covered in small polyps, each of which has eight branched tentacles. However, the supporting skeleton is made mainly from hard calcium carbonate colored a deep red or pink. This coral is now scarce in places that are easily accessible to collectors.
Shaded rocks and caves
HABITAT
Mediterranean and warm waters of eastern Atlantic
CLASS ANTHOZOA
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Slender Sea Pen
Giant Anemone
Virgularia mirabilis
Condylactis gigantea HEIGHT
DIAMETER
Up to 24 in (60 cm)
(30 cm)
DEPTH
DEPTH
Up to 12 in
33–1,300 ft (10–400 m)
10–165 ft (3–50 m)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Sediment
rocks
Coral reefs and
Tropical waters of Caribbean Sea and western Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
The muddy bottoms of sheltered sea lochs in Scotland and Norway are often carpeted in dense beds of slender sea pens. This species has a structure similar to the orange sea pen (see below, left) but has a much thinner central stalk and thin branches. Almost half the stalk is buried in the sediment and the colony can withdraw into the sediment if disturbed.
The long, purple-tipped tentacles of this large anemone bring a splash of color to Caribbean reefs. Its columnar body is usually tucked away between rocks or corals, leaving only the stinging tentacles exposed. Several small reef fish (mainly blennies) can live unharmed among the tentacles, where they gain protection from predators. The giant anemone can move slowly along on its basal disk if it wants to find a better position on the reef.
DISTRIBUTION
Often called precious coral, Mediterranean red coral has been collected and its skeleton made into jewelry for centuries. In spite of
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Orange Sea Pen Ptilosarcus gurneyi HEIGHT
Up to 20 in (50 cm) DEPTH
33–1,000 ft (10–300 m) HABITAT
Sediment DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern
Pacific
Unlike the majority of anthozoans, sea pens live in areas of sand and mud. They get their name from their resemblance
to an old-fashioned quill pen. The orange sea pen consists of a central stem with branches on either side. The basal part of the stem is bulbous and anchors the colony in the sediment. Single rows of polyps extend their eight tentacles into the water from each leaflike branch, giving the front of the sea pen a downy appearance. The colony faces toward the prevailing current to maximize the flow of plankton over the feeding polyps. When no current is flowing, the colony can retract down into the sediment. Although they tend to stay in one place, colonies can relocate and re-anchor themselves if necessary. Predators of sea pens include sea slugs and starfish.
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Beadlet Anemone Actinia equina
acrorhagi containing stinging cells
DIAMETER
Up to
23/4
in (7 cm)
DEPTH
OCEAN LIFE
0–65 ft (0–20 m) HABITAT
Hard surfaces Coastal waters of Mediterranean, northeastern and eastern Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
Most anemones cannot survive out of water, but the beadlet anemone can do so provided it stays damp. At low tide, this anemone can be found on rocky shores with its tentacles
retracted, looking like a blob of red or green jelly. The top of the anemone’s body is ringed with blue beads called acrorhagi. These contain numerous stinging cells, which the anemone uses to repel any close neighbors. Leaning over, it will sting any anemone within reach, and the defeated anemone will move slowly out of the victor’s territory. The beadlet anemone broods its eggs and young inside the body and ejects them through its mouth.
cnidarians CLASS ANTHOZOA
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Plumose Anemone
Cloak Anemone
Metridium senile
Adamsia carciniopados Up to 12 in
HEIGHT
DIAMETER
(30 cm) DEPTH
2 in (5 cm)
0–330 ft (0–100 m)
HABITAT
DEPTH
0–650 ft (0–200 m)
Any hard
surface
HABITAT
Hermit crab shells DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of north Atlantic and north Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
This tall anemone resembles an ornate piece of architecture. It has a long column, topped by a collarlike ring and a wavy disk with thousands of fine tentacles. The most common colors are white or orange, but it can also be brown, gray, red, or yellow. Fragments from the base of large anemones can grow into tiny new anemones. The plumose anemone is often found on pier pilings and wrecks projecting out into the current.
The cloak anemone lives with its wide base wrapped around the shell of a hermit crab and its tentacles trailing beneath the crab’s head. In this position, the tentacles are ideally placed to pick up food scraps. The enveloping column of the anemone is off-white with distinct pink spots. Neither partner thrives without the other, though young cloak anemones can be found on rocks and shells between the tidemarks waiting to find a host.
!2-/2%$ 6%()#,% 4HEHERMITCRABPagurus prideaux ISALWAYSSEENWITHITSPROTECTIVE ANEMONECLOAK)TDOESNOTHAVE TOFINDABIGGERSHELLASITGROWS BECAUSETHECLOAKANEMONE SECRETESAHORNYEXTENSION4HE ANEMONEONTHECRABONTHELEFT HASTHROWNOUTPINKSTINGING THREADS CALLEDACONTIA TOREPEL ANOTHERHERMITCRAB
269
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Antarctic Anemone Urticinopsis antarctica SIZE
Not recorded DEPTH
15–740 ft (5–225 m) HABITAT
Rocky sea beds Southern Ocean around Antarctica and South Shetland Islands
DISTRIBUTION
Like many other Antarctic marine animals, the Antarctic anemone grows to a large size, but rather slowly. It has long tentacles with powerful stinging cells and is capable of catching and eating starfish, sea urchins, and jellyfish much larger than itself. As there are often many anemones living close together, two or more may hold a large jellyfish. As in most anemones, stinging cells on the tentacles fire barbed threads into the prey to hold it and to paralyze or kill it.
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Jewel Anemone Corynactis viridis DIAMETER 1/2
in (1 cm)
DEPTH
0–260 ft (0–80 m) HABITAT
Steep rocky areas Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Jewel anemones often cover large areas of underwater cliff faces, creating a spectacular display. Individuals can be almost any color, and they reproduce by splitting in half, making two new identical anemones. This results in dense patches of differentcolored anemones. Each anemone has a small saucer-shaped disk circled by stubby translucent tentacles. The tentacles have knobbed tips that are often a contrasting color to the tentacle shafts, disk, and column of the anemone. The color combination shown here is one of the most common. Jewel anemones are not true anemones but belong to a group of anthozoans called coralliomorphs. These closely resemble the polyps of hard corals but have no skeleton. Coralliomorphs are found in all oceans but are most common in the tropics.
270
animal life CLASS ANTHOZOA
Table Coral Acropora hyacinthus DIAMETER
Up to 10 ft ( 3 m) DEPTH
0–33 ft (0–10 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs Tropical waters of Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and western and central Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
The magnificent flat plates of table coral are ideally shaped to expose as much of their surface as possible to sunlight. Like most hard corals, the cells of table coral contain zooxanthellae that need light to photosynthesize and manufacture food for themselves and their host. Table coral is supported on a short, stout stem that is attached to the seabed by a spreading base. The horizontal plates have numerous branches that mostly project upward from the surface, so each plate,
or table, resembles a bed of nails. Each of these branches is lined by cup-shaped extensions of the skeleton called corallites, from which the polyps extend their tentacles in order to feed, mainly at night. The usual color of table coral is a dull brown or green, but it is brightened up by the numerous reef fish that shelter under and around its plates. However, the shade the plates cast means that few other corals can live underneath a table coral. There are many other similar species that are also called table coral, but Acropora hyacinthus is one of the most abundant and widespread.
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Hump Coral Porites lobata DIAMETER
Up to 20 ft (6 m) DEPTH
0–165 ft (0–50 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs Tropical waters of Red Sea, Persian Gulf, and Indian and Pacific oceans
DISTRIBUTION
PEOPLE
#(!2,)%6%2/. "ORNIN3YDNEY !USTRALIA IN #HARLIE6ERONHASBEEN DUBBEDTHEª+INGOF#ORAL«FOR HISLIFELONGWORKONCORALREEFS (EHASFORMALLYNAMEDAND DESCRIBEDOVERNEWCORAL SPECIES INCLUDINGMANYFROM THEGENUSAcropora(ISTHREE VOLUMEBOOKCorals of the WorldISACLASSICTEXT It can be difficult to tell that hump coral is a living coral colony because it looks just like a large, lumpy rock. Closer inspection will show that the coral grows as a series of large lobes formed into a dome. The living polyps are tiny, with tentacles that are only about 1/32 in (1 mm) long, and during the day, they are hidden in their shallow skeleton cups. At night, they extend their tentacles to feed and the colony takes on a softer appearance. Hump coral is an important reefbuilding species.
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Daisy Coral Goniopora djiboutiensis DIAMETER
Up to 3 ft (1 m) DEPTH
15–100 ft (5–30 m) HABITAT
Turbid reef waters Tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
In most corals it is difficult to see the tiny polyps, but the daisy coral has polyps that are a few inches long. The head of each polyp is dome-shaped with the mouth in the middle, surrounded by a ring of about 24 tentacles. These are arranged rather like the petals of a daisy. Unlike the majority of corals, the polyps extend to feed during the day, though they will quickly withdraw if touched. Daisy coral grows as a rounded lump, but the shape is difficult to see when the polyps are extended. While most corals need clear water to survive, this species often covers large areas where the water is made turbid by disturbed sediment.
271 CLASS ANTHOZOA
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Mushroom Coral
Giant Brain Coral
Fungia scruposa
Colpophyllia natans DIAMETER
DIAMETER
Up to 1 in (2.5 cm)
(2 m)
DEPTH
DEPTH
Up to 61/2 ft
0–80 ft (0–25 m)
3–180 ft (1–55 m)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Seaward side of coral reefs
Sediment and rubble DISTRIBUTION Tropical waters of Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Mushroom coral is unusual in that it lives as a single individual rather than a colony. Juveniles start life as a small disk attached to dead coral or rock. By the time they reach about 11/2 in (4 cm) in diameter, they become detached. The animal feeds at night and the tentacles are withdrawn during the day, leaving the skeleton clearly visible, with the mouth at the center of the disk. The skeleton resembles the gills of a mushroom. Mushroom coral uses its tentacles to turn itself the right way up if it is overturned by waves.
This huge coral grows as giant domes or extensive thick crusts and can live for more than 100 years. The surface of the colony is a convoluted series of ridges and long valleys, as in other species of brain coral, and this is what gives it its name. The valleys and ridges are often differently colored and the ridges have a distinct groove running along the top. Typically, the valleys are green or brown and the ridges are brown. The polyp mouths are hidden in the valleys and the tentacles are only extended at night. In recent years, giant brain corals in the Tortugas Islands (south of the Florida Keys) have been attacked by a disease and some have died. Particularly large colonies are popular tourist attractions in islands such as Tobago. As well as attracting divers, the coral heads attract fish, and some gobies live permanently on the coral.
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Dendrophyllid Coral Dendrophyllia species HEIGHT
Up to 2 in (5 cm) DEPTH
10–165 ft (3–50 m) HABITAT
Steep rock faces DISTRIBUTION Tropical waters in Indian Ocean and from western Pacific to Polynesia
With their large, flamboyant polyps, corals of the genus Dendrophyllia look more like an anemone than a coral. Dendrophyllids belong to a group
Tropical waters of Gulf of Mexico
and Caribbean
called cup corals. They grow as a lowbranching colony with each tubular individual distinct, and they do not develop the massive skeleton of reefbuilding corals. They have no zooxanthellae and grow in shaded parts of reefs such as below overhangs and especially on steep cliff faces. During the day, the polyps are entirely withdrawn and the coral looks like a dull reddish lump. As darkness falls, the polyps expand their orange tentacles to feed on plankton and make a spectacular display that often covers large areas. This genus of coral is very difficult to identify to species level and can also be confused with cup corals belonging to the genus Tubastrea.
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Devonshire Cup Coral Caryophyllia smithii DIAMETER
11/4 in (3 cm)
cup-shaped skeleton attached to a rock or even a shipwreck. When the tentacles are expanded, these tiny corals look just like anemones, with each tapering, transparent tentacle ending in a small knob. Devonshire cup coral occurs in a variety of colors from white to orange.
DEPTH
0–330 ft (0–100 m) HABITAT
Rocks and
wrecks Northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
While most corals grow as colonies in tropical waters, the Devonshire cup coral is solitary and lives in temperate parts of the ocean. It grows with its
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Lophelia Coral DIAMETER
At least 33 ft (10 m) DEPTH
165–10,000 ft (50–3,000 m) HABITAT
Deep-sea reefs
Atlantic, eastern Pacific, and western Indian Ocean; distribution not fully known
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Lophelia pertusa
Lophelia reefs more than 8 miles (13 km) long and 100 ft (30 m) high have been recorded off the coast of Norway. Because it lives in deep, dark water, this cold-water coral has no zooxanthellae to help build its white, branching skeleton. It therefore grows very slowly, and such large reefs are many hundreds of years old. Each polyp has 16 tentacles, which it uses to capture prey such as zooplankton and even krill from the passing current. Stinging cells render the prey immobile and it is then transferred to the mouth.
272
animal life CLASS ANTHOZOA
White Zoanthid Parazoanthus anguicomus HEIGHT
1 in (2.5 cm)
65–1,300 ft (20–400 m)
DEPTH
Shaded rocks, wrecks, and shells
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern
Atlantic
Most zoanthids are found in tropical waters, but the white zoanthid is common in the north Atlantic. Its white polyps arise from an encrusting base and it has two circles of tentacles around the mouth. One circle is usually held upward while the other lies flat. As well as covering rocks and wrecks, this species also encrusts worm tubes and Lophelia reefs (see p.179).
CLASS ANTHOZOA
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Whip Coral
Bushy Black Coral
Cirrhipathes species
Antipathes pennacea
LENGTH
HEIGHT
Up to 3 ft (1 m)
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m)
DEPTH
DEPTH
10–165 ft (3–50 m)
15–1,100 ft (5–330 m)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Coral reefs Tropical waters of eastern Indian Ocean and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Whip corals, or wire corals, belong to a group of anthozoans called antipatharians to which the black corals (see right) also belong. Whip coral grows as a single unbranched colony that can be either straight
branches. Made of a tough, horny material, the skeleton is valuable as it can be cut and polished to make jewelry, although this species is not widely used for this purpose.
or coiled as in the species belonging to the genus Cirripathes shown here (whip corals are difficult to identify and many species remain undescribed). The feeding polyps of whip corals and black corals can be seen easily because, unlike sea fans, they cannot retract their short, pointed tentacles. Gobies live among the tentacles, hanging onto the coral with suckerlike pelvic fins.
Coral reefs Tropical waters of Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea, and western Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
Bushy black coral grows as a plantlike colony with branches shaped like large bird feathers. There are many different species of black corals, and they get their name from the strong black skeleton that strengthens their
CLASS ANTHOZOA
Tube Anemone Cerianthus membranaceus HEIGHT
14 in (35 cm) DEPTH
33–330 ft (10–100 m) HABITAT
Muddy sand
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
Mediterranean and northeast Atlantic
The long, pale tentacles of the tube anemone make a spectacular display but at the slightest disturbance, the animal will disappear down its tube in an instant. Tube anemones look superficially like true anemones but are more closely related to black corals (see above). They live in tubes made of sediment-encrusted mucus that can be up to 3 ft (1 m) long even though the animals are only about a third of this length. The slippery lining of the tube allows the animal to retreat rapidly. As well as about 100 long, slender outer tentacles, the animal has an inner ring of very short tentacles surrounding the mouth. The outer tentacles may look dangerous, but the tube anemone feeds only on plankton and suspended organic debris.
273
FLATWORMS thin bodies, some of which are even transparent, KINGDOM Animalia flatworms are among the simplest of PHYLUM Platyhelminthes animals. Colorful marine species mostly CLASSES 4 belong to a group called polyclad flatworms—conspicuous, leaf-shaped SPECIES 20,000 animals, common on coral reefs and easily mistaken for sea slugs. Some flatworms are found in freshwater and many are parasitic. In the oceans, parasitic tapeworms and flukes are common in fish, mammals, and birds. POSSESSING EXTREMELY
DOMAIN Eucarya
ONE-WAY RELATIONSHIP
This flatworm is living within the mantle of a bivalve mollusk, and scooping food from its host.
ANATOMY
REPRODUCTION
The flatworm has a simple, solid structure with no internal cavity. It is so thin that oxygen can diffuse in from the water, and there are no blood or circulatory systems. The head end contains sense organs; advanced species have primitive eyes. The gut opens to the outside at one end, the opening serving as both mouth and anus. In polyclad flatworms, this opening is in the middle underside BODY SECTION of the body. When feeding, they In flatworms, the space between the internal extend a muscular tube (pharynx) organs is filled with soft connective tissue out of the mouth to grasp their crisscrossed by muscles. food. Polyclad flatworms are dorso-ventral longitudinal gut muscle covered in tiny hairs (or cilia) muscle gut which, together with simple connective branch tissue muscles, help them to glide over almost any surface. The anatomy of tapeworms and flukes is adapted to suit their parasitic lifestyle.
Most flatworms are hermaphrodites, so every individual has both ovaries and testes. The reproductive system is complex for such a primitive animal and includes special chambers and tubules where the ripe eggs are fertilized. When two polyclad flatworms meet, they may briefly touch heads and bodies in a short ritual before mating. After mating, the eggs are released into the water, laid in sand, or stuck to rocks. In some flatworms, the eggs develop directly into juvenile worms but in others they develop initially into an eightlobed planktonic larva. COMPLEX APPARATUS Called Müller’s larva, it swims for a few days and Polyclad flatworms have a complex copulatory then settles onto the apparatus that includes a seabed and flattens out penis, muscular sac, and various glands. into a young flatworm.
CLASS TURBELLARIA
CLASS TURBELLARIA
Acoel Flatworm
Candy Stripe Flatworm
Waminoa species Less than 1/4 in
LENGTH
Prostheceraeus vittatus
(5 mm) DEPTH
LENGTH
Not recorded
Up to 2 in (5 cm)
On bubble coral (Pleurogyra sinuosa)
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
DEPTH
0–100 ft (0–30 m) HABITAT
Tropical Indian and Pacific oceans
These diminutive flatworms look like colored spots on the bubble coral on which they live. Their ultra-thin bodies glide over the coral surface as they graze, probably eating organic debris trapped by coral mucus. Acoel flatworms have no eyes and instead of a gut, they have a network of digestive cells. They are able to reproduce by fragmentation, each piece forming a new individual. The genus is difficult to identify to species level and the distribution is uncertain.
Muddy rocks CLASS TURBELLARIA
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Green Acoel Flatworm
Most brightly colored flatworms are found on tropical reefs, but the candy stripe flatworm is an exception and can be found as far north as Norway. Generally a cream color, it is marked with reddish-brown, lengthwise stripes. The head end of its flattened, leaf-shaped body has a pair of distinct tentacles and groups of primitive eyes. As it crawls along, the flatworm pushes the edges of its body up into folds; it is also able to swim using sinuous movements of the body. Usually found in rocky areas, it has also been seen on sand.
Convoluta roscoffensis Up to 1/2 in
LENGTH
(1.5 cm) DEPTH
Intertidal
Sheltered sandy shores
HABITAT
Northeastern Atlantic; probably more widespread than shown
DISTRIBUTION
flatworm on bubble coral
OCEAN LIFE
Although difficult to see individually, these flatworms show up when they collect together in puddles of water on sandy shores at low tide. Their bodies harbor tiny, single-celled algae that color them bright green. In warm, sunlit pools the algae can photosynthesize and pass some of the food they make to their host. These flatworms are very sensitive to vibrations and quickly disappear down into the sand if footsteps approach.
274
animal life CLASS TURBELLARIA
Exquisite Lined Flatworm
CLASS TURBELLARIA
Divided Flatworm Pseudoceros dimidiatus
Pseudobiceros bedfordi
LENGTH
Up to 3 in (8 cm)
LENGTH
DEPTH
Up to 3 in (8 cm)
Not recorded
DEPTH
HABITAT
Not recorded HABITAT
Coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of Indian and western
Pacific oceans
Tropical waters of Indian and western
Pacific oceans
Divers frequently come across this beautiful flatworm on coral reefs. Its striking pattern of pinkish transverse stripes and white dots against a black background make it easily recognizable. It is usually seen crawling over rocks in search of tunicates and crustaceans, but it is also a fairly good swimmer. Sometimes, the head end is reared up and a pair of flaplike tentacles can be seen.
CLASS TURBELLARIA
Thysanozoon Flatworm Thysanozoon nigropapillosum LENGTH
Up to 3 in (8 cm) DEPTH
3–100 ft (1–30 m) HABITAT
Coral reef slopes DISTRIBUTION
Coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of Indian and western
Pacific oceans
The highly convoluted edge of the very thin thysanozoon flatworm is prominently displayed with a white outline. The rest of the upper side
Most species of flatworms display a distinctive pattern of colors that is more or less the same in every individual. However, the color patterns of the divided flatworm vary greatly between individuals. The body is always black with an orange margin, but the width and arrangement of the yellow or white lateral stripes, zebralike bars, or narrow and wide longitudinal stripes is highly variable. These highly contrasting colors act as a warning to predators that divided flatworms are not good to eat. Like other flatworms, this species has numerous photoand chemosensitive cells in its head region, which help the worm to find food and avoid danger. of the body is black and covered in short papillae, or protuberances, each of which ends in a yellow tip. This gives the flatworm the appearance of being peppered with yellow spots. As is the case with most tropical reef flatworms, little is known of the biology of this species, but the thysanozoon flatworm has been found in association with colonial tunicates and is thought to feed on these and other colonial animals. It has been observed to swim well, rhythmically undulating its wide body. Much of what is known about this and other tropical reef flatworms has come from observations made by recreational divers and photographers. A similar species, Thyanozoon flavomaculatum, is found on Red Sea coral reefs.
CLASS TURBELLARIA
Imitating Flatworm Pseudoceros imitatus LENGTH
Up to 1 in (2 cm) DEPTH
Not recorded HABITAT
Coral reefs Waters around New Guinea and northern Australia, perhaps more extensive
DISTRIBUTION
The imitating flatworm has a creamy gray background color and black reticulations surrounding pale pustules.
imitation of the skin of the sea slug Phylidiella pustulosa, and the flatworm’s color pattern is also almost identical to that of the sea slug. The sea slug secretes a noxious chemical to deter potential predators, and it may be that the imitating flatworm gains protection by looking and feeling to the touch like the distasteful sea slug.
Unlike the majority of polyclad flatworms, which have a relatively smooth skin, the imitating flatworm has a bumpy surface covered in small pustules. This appearance is an SOURCE OF INSPIRATION
Phylidiella pustulosa is one of the most common and widespread sea slugs on IndoPacific reefs about 15–130 ft (5–40 m) deep.
CLASS TURBELLARIA
Giant Leaf Worm Kaburakia excelsa LENGTH
Up to 4 in (10 cm) DEPTH
be seen through the skin. It feeds in the same way as most polyclad flatworms, by everting its pharynx over its prey. Most intertidal flatworms in this region are only about 1 in (2 cm) long, making this species easy to identify. It is common on floating docks and in mussel beds.
Intertidal HABITAT
Under coastal rocks DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern
Pacific
This large, oval flatworm crawls around rocks, stones, and undergrowth on the Pacific shores of North America. Its color is reddish-brown to tan, marked with darker spots, and when it is fully spread out, the branches of its digestive system may
CLASS CESTODA
Broad Fish Tapeworm OCEAN LIFE
GOOD IMITATION
Diphyllobothrium latum LENGTH
Up to 33 ft (10 m) DEPTH
Dependent on host HABITAT
Parasitic DISTRIBUTION
host species
Probably worldwide, dependent on
Some flatworms, including tapeworms, have become highly modified and live as parasites. The broad fish tapeworm has a complex life history. It begins life as a fertilized egg that is eaten by tiny freshwater crustaceans, inside which the larvae hatch. Freshwater, estuarine, and migratory marine fish, (such as salmon) become infected by the larvae when they eat either the crustaceans or other infected fish. The adult tapeworm lives in fish-eating mammals and may infect humans who eat raw fish. Other tapeworm species live as adults in the guts of marine fish.
ribbon worms
RIBBON WORMS worms, ribbon worms can reach great lengths KINGDOM Animalia of at least 160 ft (50 m), although PHYLUM Nemertea many are small and inconspicuous. CLASSES 2 While they are commonly slightly flattened, the longest are cylindrical SPECIES 900 and are often called bootlace worms. The majority of ribbon worms live in the sea under rocks, among undergrowth or in sediment, and some are parasitic. A few species live inside the shells of mollusks and crabs. ALSO CALLED NEMERTEAN
DOMAIN Eucarya
ANATOMY
stylet
proboscis
275
nerve ganglion
nerve Nemertean worms have a long, excretory unsegmented body with strong muscles in organs the body wall that can shorten the worm to a proboscis fraction of its full length. Unlike flatworms, ribbon sheath worms have blood vessels and a complete gut with blood vessel mouth and anus. It is often difficult to distinguish between the front and rear end of the worm, but most ovary species have many simple eyes at the front. The most characteristic feature of these worms is a strong, tubular structure called a proboscis that lies in a sheath above gut the gut. It can be thrust out by hydrostatic pressure, either through the mouth or a separate opening, and is used to capture prey. BODY SECTION Ribbon worms have no body cavity In some species, the proboscis is or gills; a simple circulatory system armed with a sharp stylet. carries oxygen around the body.
REPRODUCTION
WARNING PATTERN
Some ribbon worms have bright patterns that may serve as a warning to predators that they are toxic. Drab-colored species only emerge at night to hunt.
CLASS ANOPLA
Football Jersey Worm Tubulanus annulatus LENGTH
Up to 30 in
(75 cm) 0–130 ft (0–40 m)
DEPTH
Gravel, stones, and sediment
HABITAT
Cold and temperate waters of north Atlantic and north Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
One of the most strikingly colored ribbon worms, the football jersey worm has a patterning of longitudinal white lines and regularly spaced white rings. It may be found lying in an untidy pile beneath stones on the lower shore and may also be seen scavenging when the tide is out. More usually it lives below the shore on almost any type of seabed, including mud, sand, and shell gravel. To camouflage itself, it secretes a mucous tube that becomes covered in surrounding sediment.
Most marine ribbon worms have separate sexes and their numerous, simple gonads produce either eggs or sperm. These are usually shed into the sea through pores along the sides of the body. Some species cocoon themselves together in a mucous net where the eggs are duly fertilized. In some types of ribbon worms, the eggs develop directly into juvenile worms, while others initially hatch into various types of larvae. The long, fragile bodies of ribbon worms tend to break easily SWIMMING LARVA but they have the useful ability to Some ribbon worms develop from a regenerate any lost parts. Some species planktonic larva called even use regeneration as a method of a pilidium. It is able asexual reproduction, where the body to swim by beating breaks up into several pieces and each hairlike structures, piece develops a new head and tail. called cilia.
CLASS ANOPLA
Bootlace Worm Lineus longissimus LENGTH
Up to 33 ft (10 m) DEPTH
Not recorded HABITAT
Sediments and stones DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeast
Atlantic
The bootlace worm makes up for its rather drab brown color by its incredible length. Only a fraction of an inch in diameter, it reaches at least 33 ft (10 m) in length, and is one of the longest animals known. On the shore it appears as a writhing mass of knots lying on muddy sediment beneath boulders. Like all anoplan worms, it has its mouth behind the brain. This worm is difficult to pick up, because it exudes large amounts of mucus when handled.
CLASS ENOPLA
Ribbon Worm Nipponnemertes pulcher LENGTH
Up to 31/2 in
(9 cm) 0–1,900 ft (0–570 m)
DEPTH
Coarse sediments
HABITAT
Temperate and cold waters of Arctic, Atlantic, Pacific and Southern oceans
DISTRIBUTION
beneath. This species has a distinctive, shield-shaped head with numerous eyes along its edges. The number of eyes increases with age. It is usually seen when dredged up by scientists from the coarse sediments in which it lives, but is sometimes found beneath stones on the lower shore. Its full distribution is unknown.
OCEAN LIFE
This worm belongs to a class of nemertean worms called enoplan ribbon worms, whose mouth is located in front of the brain. Nipponnemertes pulcher has a short, stout body with a width of up to 1/4 in (5 mm) that tapers to a pointed tail. The coloration varies from pink to orange or deep red and is paler
276
animal life
SEGMENTED WORMS include two familiar, predominantly land-based KINGDOM Animalia and freshwater groups, the earthworms PHYLUM Annelidia and the leeches. In the oceans, a third CLASSES 3 group, the bristleworms or polychaetes, are numerous and diverse. These SPECIES About 15,000 include burrowing lugworms, free-living predatory ragworms, and tube-dwelling worms. All segmented worms share one main characteristic—the long, soft body is divided into a series of almost identical, linked segments. SEGMENTED WORMS
DOMAIN Eucarya
BRISTLEWORM
Fire worms have long, sharp bristles on each body section. These break off if the worm is attacked and can cause severe skin irritation.
ANATOMY
REPRODUCTION
Each body segment is called a metamere and, except for the head and tail tip, all are virtually indistinguishable from each other. In bristleworms, flattened lobes (parapods) project from the sides of each segment, and are reinforced by strong rods made of chitin.The worm uses parapods for locomotion, parapod and projecting bundles of bristles help it to grip. Internally, the segments are separated ventral by partitions and filled with fluid. nerve The gut, nerve cord, and large blood cord nerve vessels run all along the body.
In most polychaete worms, the sexes are separate and the eggs and sperm are shed into the water. Spawning is usually seasonal, especially at temperate latitudes. In many species, the fertilized egg develops into a larva (trochophore) that resembles epitoke a tiny spinning top. It floats and swims in the plankton, propelled by the beating of hairlike cilia around its middle. Eventually, the larva elongates and constricts into segments as it turns into an adult. Some species brood their eggs until the larvae are well developed. Many polychaete worms change shape as they become sexually mature, becoming little more than swimming READY TO BURST bags of eggs or sperm. The egg- or sperm-laden Known as epitokes, they epitoke of a palolo worm swarm, burst open to release separates from the front the eggs or sperm, then die. segments, and bursts open.
ganglion
epidermis
BODY SECTIONS
intestine
Most segments excretory organ contain their own (nephridium) organs, including excretory and reproductive organs, and branches from the main blood vessels and ventral nerve cord.
dorsal blood vessel segmental blood vessel
JAWS OF A PREDATOR
This bobbit worm seizes prey using a proboscis tipped with sharp mandibles, which it shoots out from the mouth.
epitoke
excretory organ (nephridium)
parapod ventral nerve cord
CLASS POLYCHAETA
CLASS POLYCHAETA
Sea Mouse
Lugworm
Aphrodita aculaeta
Arenicola marina
LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
DEPTH
DEPTH
Shore and just below
Shallow to moderate
HABITAT
HABITAT
Sand, muddy sand
Muddy sand
Temperate coastal waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
Temperate shores of northeastern Atlantic, Mediterranean, and western Baltic
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
One of the most familiar sights on western European beaches is the neat, coiled casts of undigested sand deposited by lugworms. The worm itself is rarely seen, remaining hidden in its U-shaped tube beneath the surface of the sand. The entrance to the tube is marked by a shallow, saucer-shaped depression in the sand. The worm may be pink, red, brown, black, or green. The first six segments of its front section are thick with bristles, while the next thirteen segments have red, feathery gills. The rear third of the body is thin, with no gills or bristles. Lugworms feed by eating sand, extracting organic matter from it, and expelling the waste.These fleshy worms are a favorite food of many wading birds and are also used by fishermen as bait. They are most abundant at midshore level in sediments containing reasonable amounts of organic matter.
CLASS POLYCHAETA
Green Paddle Worm Eulalia viridis LENGTH
Up to 6 in (15 cm)
Shore and shallows
DEPTH
Rocky areas under stones, in crevices
HABITAT
Temperate coastal waters of northeastern Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
Although this beautiful green worm is usually found crawling over rocks, it can also swim well. The name paddle worm comes from the large, leafshaped appendages called parapodia that are attached to the side of each
body segment and aid in swimming. The head has two pairs of stout tentacles on each side, a single tentacle on top, and four short, forwardpointing tentacles at the front. These tentacles and two simple black eyes help the worm in its hunt for food. The green paddle worm is attracted to dead animals, especially mussels and barnacles, but will also hunt for live prey. However, unlike the king ragworm (opposite), it does not have jaws to tackle large prey. Instead, carrion and debris sticks to its proboscis and is wiped off inside the mouth. During spring, the green paddle worm lays gelatinous green egg masses about the size of a marble on the shore and in shallow water, attaching them to seaweeds and rocks.
The segmented structure of this pretty worm can be seen only if it is turned over, because its back is disguised by a thick felt of hairs that mask its segments. Running along each side of its body are numerous stiff, black bristles and a fringe of beautiful, iridescent hairs that glow green, blue, or yellow. The bristles can cause severe irritation if they puncture the skin. The sea mouse is so called because it looks like a bedraggled mouse when washed up dead on the seashore.
segmented worms CLASS POLYCHAETA
7/2-2%%&3
King Ragworm Neanthes virens LENGTH
Up to 20 in (50 cm) DEPTH
Shore and shallows HABITAT
Muddy sand Temperate coastal waters of northeastern and northwestern Atlantic DISTRIBUTION
This large worm has strong jaws that are easily capable of delivering a painful bite to a human. The jaws are pushed out on an eversible proboscis and are used for pulling food into its mouth as well as for defending itself. The king ragworm lives in a mucuslined burrow in the sand, and waits for the tide to come in before coming out to feed. It swims well by bending its long body into a series of S-shaped curves. Fishermen collect it for bait.
crown of spines in three concentric rings
CLASS POLYCHAETA
Honeycomb Worm Sabellaria alveolata Up to 11/2 in
(4 cm) Shore and shallows
DEPTH
Mixed rock and sand areas
HABITAT
Intertidal areas of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Magnificent Feather Duster Sabellastarte magnifica LENGTH
Up to 6 in (15 cm) DEPTH
3–65 ft (1–20 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs DISTRIBUTION Shallow waters of the western Atlantic and Caribbean
(ONEYCOMBWORMSBUILDTHEIR TUBESBYGLUINGTOGETHERSAND GRAINSSTIRREDUPBYWAVES4HE GLUEISAMUCUSSECRETEDBYTHE WORM WHICHUSESALOBEDLIP AROUNDITSMOUTHTOFASHIONTHE TUBE!SNEWWORMSSETTLEOUT FROMTHEPLANKTONTOBUILDTHEIR OWNTUBES AREEFDEVELOPSAND EXPANDSSIDEWAYSANDUPWARD PROVIDEDTHEREISAGOODSUPPLY OFSAND4HESESTRUCTURESPROVIDE AHOMETOMANYOTHERSPECIES LIVE REEF
fingerlike gills on each body segment
LENGTH
CLASS POLYCHAETA
277
Live reefs will survive for many years provided new larvae settle and grow to replace wavedamaged areas and dead worms.
Although honeycomb worms are tiny, the sand tubes they build may cover many yards of rock in rounded hummocks up to 20 in (50 cm) thick. The worms build their tubes close together, and the tube openings give the colony a honeycomb appearance. This worm’s head is crowned by spines and it has numerous feathery feeding tentacles around the mouth, which it uses to trap plankton. The body ends in a thin, tubelike tail with no appendages.
The only part of this worm that is normally visible is a beautiful fan of feathery tentacles. The worm’s segmented body is hidden inside a soft, flexible tube that it builds tucked beneath rocks or in a coral crevice or buried in sand. The tentacles are in two whorls and are usually banded brown and white. They are normally extended into the water to filter out plankton, but at the slightest vibration or disturbance, such as the exhalation of a scuba diver, the worm instantly retracts the tentacles down into the safety of the tube.
CLASS POLYCHAETA
Pompeii Worm Alvinella pomejana LENGTH
Up to 4 in (10 cm)
6,500–10,000 ft (2,000–3,000 m)
DEPTH
Hydrothermal vent chimneys
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
CLASS POLYCHAETA
Christmas Tree Worm Spirobranchus giganteus LENGTH
Up to 11/4 in
(3 cm) 0–100 ft (0–30 m) or more
DEPTH
HABITAT
Living coral
heads DISTRIBUTION
Shallow reef waters throughout
the tropics
This extraordinary worm lives in thin tubes massed together on the sides of chimneys of deep-sea hydrothermal vents. The tubes are close to the chimneys’ openings, where water from deep inside Earth pours out at temperatures of up to 660˚F (350˚C). The temperature within the worm tubes reaches 160˚F (70˚C). At its head end, the Pompeii Worm has a group of large gills and a mouth surrounded by tentacles. Each of the worm’s body segments has appendages on the side called parapodia. The posterior parapodia have many hairlike outgrowths that carry a mass of chemosynthetic bacteria. The bacteria manufacture food that the worm absorbs, and the worm also eats some of the bacteria.
OCEAN LIFE
Many large coral heads in tropical waters are decorated with Christmas tree worms, which occur in a huge variety of colors. The worm lives in a calcareous tube buried in the coral and extends neat, twin spirals of feeding tentacles above the coral surface. If disturbed, the worm pulls back into its tube in a fraction of a second. For added safety, the worm can also plug its tube with a small plate called an operculum.
Eastern Pacific
278
animal life
MOLLUSKS AMONG THE MOST SUCCESSFUL of all marine animals, mollusks display great diversity and a remarkable range KINGDOM Animalia of body forms, allowing them to live almost everywhere PHYLUM Mollusca from the ocean depths to the splash zone. They include CLASSES 8 oysters, sea slugs, and octopuses. Some species lack eyes SPECIES 50,000 and shells and live passively in sediment or on the seabed. Others are intelligent, active hunters with complex nervous systems and large eyes. Filter-feeding mollusks, such as clams, are crucial to coastal ecosystems, as they provide food for other animals and improve water quality and clarity. Many mollusks are commercially important for food, pearls, and their shells. DOMAIN Eucarya
ANATOMY Most mollusks have a head, a soft body mass, and a muscular foot. The foot is formed from the lower body surface and helps it to move. Mollusks have what is called a hydrostatic skeleton—their bodies are supported by internal fluid pressure rather than a hard skeleton. All mollusks have a mantle, a body layer that covers the upper body and may or may not secrete a shell. The shell of bivalves (clams and relatives) has two halves joined by a hinge; these can be held closed by powerful muscles while the tide is out, or if danger threatens. Mollusks other than bivalves have a rasping mouthpart, or radula, which is unique to mollusks. Cephalopods (octopuses, squid, and cuttlefish) also have beaklike jaws as well as tentacles, but most lack a shell, while most gastropods (slugs and snails) have a single shell. This is usually a spiral in snails, but can be cone-shaped in other forms, such as limpets.
REEF-DWELLING GOLIATH
The tropical giant clam is the largest bivalve and may measure more than 3 ft (1 m) across and weigh over 440 lb (220 kg).
gill
GASTROPOD ANATOMY
spiral shell
mantle cavity
sensory tentacle
digestive system
eye SPIRAL SNAIL SHELL
muscular foot
radula hinge ligament
BIVALVE ANATOMY
Bivalves are housed within a shell of two halves (right) from which the siphons and muscular foot can be extended. The shell is opened and closed by the adductor muscles, labeled in the body plan (far right).
The body plan (far left) of gastropods (slugs and snails) features a head, large foot, and usually a spiral shell (left). In shelled forms, all the soft body parts can be withdrawn into the shell for protection, or to conserve moisture while uncovered by the outgoing tide.
shell mantle cavity
digestive system
siphon
muscular foot BIVALVE SHELL gill
adductor muscle
jaws feeding arm
OCEAN LIFE
radula digestive system
eye arm
internal shell
siphon gill
mantle cavity
CEPHALOPOD ANATOMY
Cephalopods have a large eye, in front of which there are a number of tentacles. The siphon functions in respiration and in rapid movement. Some forms have a small internal shell (cuttle).
mollusks
SENSE ORGANS
HUMAN IMPACT
Touch, smell, taste, and vision are well developed in many mollusks. The nervous system has several paired bundles of nervous tissue (ganglia), some of which operate the foot, and interpret sensory information such as light intensity. Photoreceptors range from the simple eyes (ocelli) seen along the edges of the mantle or on bivalve siphons, to the sophisticated image-forming eyes of cephalopods. Cephalopods are also capable of rapidly changing their color according to their mood or surroundings.
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PIGMENTED SKIN CELLS HELP CUTTLEFISH TO CHANGE COLOR
279
0EARLSFORMINOYSTERSWHENAGRAIN OFSANDOROTHERIRRITANTLODGESIN THEIRSHELLS4HEOYSTERCOATSTHE GRAINWITHASUBSTANCECALLEDNACRE FORMINGAPEARL4ODAYMANYPEARLS ARECULTUREDARTIFICIALLYTHESHELLIS OPENEDJUSTENOUGHTOINTRODUCEAN IRRITANTINTOTHEMANTLECAVITY SEEDING AN OYSTER
The best-shaped artificial pearls are produced by “seeding” oysters with a tiny pearl bead and a piece of mantle tissue from another mollusk .
1
The giant cuttlefish’s color change is due to skin cells called chromatophores. It is pale when pigment is confined to a small area of each cell.
When the cuttlefish passes over a darker background, it disperses the colored pigments throughout each of its chromatophores, and the animal darkens.
2
MOLLUSCAN BEAUTY
Displaying fabulous warning colors, this nudibranch is a shell-less example of the many thousands of marine species of gastropods (slugs and snails).
MOVEMENT Mollusks move in many different ways. Most gastropods glide across surfaces using their mucus-lubricated foot. Exceptions include the sea butterfly, which has a modified foot with finlike extensions for swimming. Some bivalves, such as scallops, also swim, producing jerky movements by clapping the two halves of their shell together. Other bivalves burrow by probing with their foot and then pulling themselves downward by muscular action. Cephalopods are efficient swimmers; some have fins on the sides of their bodies that let them hover in the water, and they can accelerate rapidly by squirting water out through their siphons.
siphon
REDUCING DRAG
Swimming backward reduces drag from the tentacles. The siphon, used for jet propulsion, is clearly visible in this Humboldt squid.
AIDED BY MUCUS
Muscular contractions ripple through the fleshy foot of this marine snail. It secretes a lubricating mucus that helps it to move on rough surfaces.
RESPIRATION Most mollusks “breathe” using gills, called ctenidia, which are situated in the mantle cavity. They are delicate structures with an extensive capillary network and a large surface area for gaseous exchange. In species that are always submerged, water can continually be drawn in and over the gills. Those living in the intertidal zone are exposed to the air for short periods and must keep their gills moist. At low tide, bivalves close their shells but retain a little water inside. Some gastropods also clamp down against rocks to retain moisture, but pulmonate snails have lost their ctenidia and instead have a lung formed from the mantle cavity. They take in air while exposed and respire through their skin while immersed. The respiratory pigment in most molluscan blood is a copper compound called hemocyanin. It is not as efficient at taking up oxygen as hemoglobin external gills and gives mollusks’ blood (ctenidia) a blue color.
Nudibranchs (sea slugs) have feathery external gills toward the rear of their bodies. The warning coloration of this species includes the bright orange gills.
OCEAN LIFE
COLOR CODING
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animal life
FEEDING
OCEAN LIFE
The ways in which mollusks feed are almost as varied as their anatomy. Sedentary mollusks, such as many bivalves including clams and oysters, create water currents through tubular outgrowths of their mantle (siphons). They filter food from the moving water with their mucuscovered gills. Suitably sized particles are then selected and passed to the mouth by bristly flaps called palps. Sea slugs, chitons, and many sea snails graze algae from hard surfaces using their rasplike radula. Radulae have toothlike structures called denticles, many of which are reinforced with an iron deposit for durability. Larger mollusks feed on crustaceans, worms, fish, and other mollusks, which they locate either by scent or, in the case of some cephalopods such as octopuses, by sight. Cephalopods use their suckered arms to capture prey and their parrotlike beak to crush and dismember it. Some squid even appear to hunt in packs and swim in formation over reefs looking for prey.
SPECIES-SPECIFIC DENTICLES
The denticles on a mollusk’s radula are often species-specific. This electron micrograph shows the distinctive radula of the gastropod Sinezona rimuloides.
FEEDING TRAIL
Limpets continually graze the same area as the algae on which they feed regrow rapidly. The abrasive radula of the limpet wears a trail on the rock surface, as shown above.
mollusks LIMPET CHAIN
REPRODUCTION
DEVELOPING EMBRYOS
In 4 months, Australian giant cuttlefish eggs develop into mini-replicas of the adults.
Slipper limpets change from male to female as they grow. This chain of four such limpets has a female at the bottom and smaller males above her.
In many mollusks, reproduction simply involves releasing sperm or eggs (gametes) into the water. Fertilization is external and there is no parental care. Individuals may be of separate sexes or hermaphrodites (having both male and female reproductive organs). Hermaphrodites may function as either male or female or, as in nudibranchs, produce both eggs and sperm, although eggs can be fertilized only by cross-fertilization. Some species, such as slipper limpets, change sex with age, while oysters can change sex several times in a breeding season. Among cephalopods, males court females, fertilization is internal, and in some species, the eggs are protected by the females until they hatch.
HUMAN IMPACT
LIFE CYCLES
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Most mollusks produce eggs that either float or are deposited in clusters, anchored to the substrate. Most forms have eggs that hatch into shell-less larvae, which live in the plankton. The larvae are called ciliated trochophores due to their bands of hairlike cilia, used in PLANKTONIC LARVA swimming. In gastropods, bivalves, The visible bands of this veliger larva of the and scaphopods, the trochophore common limpet beat with tiny hairlike cilia, which are used in locomotion and feeding. larvae change into veliger larvae, which have larger ciliated bands, and sometimes adult features such as a mantle or a rudimentary shell or both. As they approach maturity, the larvae float down from the surface and, on reaching the seabed, change into adults. Only those that land in a suitable environment survive to reach sexual maturity. Cephalopod eggs hatch into active predators. Some resemble mini-adults; others live in the plankton and initially look and behave differently from the adults.
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Relatively long-lived and reproducing only sporadically, the common oyster (right) takes a long time to recover from overexploitation.
READY AND WAITING FOR PREY
This cuttlefish hovers with its arms outstretched. When prey comes within reach, the two feeding arms, currently contracted and set above the two lower arms, will shoot forward to grab the prey.
281
SECURING EGG CLUSTERS each finger-shaped egg capsule holds up to seven eggs
This female bigfin reef squid produces up to 400 egg capsules containing about 2,500 eggs. Here, she is securing egg capsules to a solid substrate.
MOLLUSK CLASSIFICATION The phylum Mollusca is the second-largest animal phylum, comprising over 50,000 species, and their diverse form has led to the identification of eight different classes. The majority of species live in marine habitats, but freshwater and terrestrial species are also numerous.
BIVALVES Class Bivalvia
CEPHALOPODS Class Cephalopoda
More than 14,000 species
About 650 species
Squid, octopuses, and cuttlefish are all cephalopods—fast-moving and intelligent, with a complex nervous system and large eyes. The shell is internal or absent, the head surrounded by arms, with or without suckers. The central mouth has a parrotlike beak and a radula. The sexes are separate.
MONOPLACOPHORANS Class Monoplacophora
About 70 species
8 species
These are marine, shell-less, wormlike organisms of deep-water sediments. Their horny outer layer is covered with spines.
These deep-sea mollusks lack eyes but have a radula and a conelike shell. They are more abundant as fossils than as living species.
GASTROPODS Class Gastropoda
SOLENOGASTERS Class Solenogaster
TUSK SHELLS Class Scaphopoda
About 180 species
About 350 species
Another marine class of shell-less, wormlike organisms, solenogasters live in or on the ocean floor. Some lack a radula.
These animals have a tubular, tapering shell, open at both ends. The head and foot project from the wider end and dig in soft sediments.
More than 35,000 species
Familiar as slugs and snails, these mollusks are marine, freshwater, and terrestrial. They have a spiral shell and a large, muscular foot. The body is twisted 180º so the mantle cavity lies over the head. Many species can retract into their shell; hermaphrodite species are common.
CHITONS Class Polyplacophora About 500 species
Chitons have a uniform structure with a series of plates (usually 8) on their backs enclosed by an extension of the mantle. The underside is dominated by the foot.
OCEAN LIFE
CAUDOFOVEATES Class Caudofoveata
Bivalves, or clams and their relatives, have a hinged shell of two halves, but no radula. Most are sedentary and marine. Siphons create a water current through the shell, aiding feeding and respiration. Sexes are usually separate.
282
animal life CLASS BIVALVIA
Common Mussel Mytilus edulis LENGTH
4–6 in (10–15 cm) HABITAT
Intertidal zones, coasts, estuaries North and southeastern Atlantic, northeastern and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Also called the blue mussel, this edible, black-shelled bivalve attaches itself in large numbers to various substrates using tough fibers called byssal threads. These fibers are extremely strong— five times tougher than a human tendon—and prevent the mussels from being washed away. When the mussel opens its shell, water is drawn in over the gills, or ctenidia, which absorb oxygen into the tissues and also filter food particles out of the water. Common mussels are very efficient filter feeders—they process about 10– 18 gallons (45–70 liters) of water per day and consume almost everything they trap. The sexes are separate and so grouping together in “beds” helps to ensure that their eggs are fertilized. After hatching, the planktonic larvae are dispersed by the ocean currents. After about three months, they settle and mature further before moving once again to join the adult population.
CLASS BIVALVIA
Black-lip Pearl Oyster Pinctada margaritifera LENGTH
Up to 12 in (30 cm) diameter HABITAT
Hard substrata of interand subtidal zones; reefs CLASS BIVALVIA
Gulf of Mexico, western and eastern Indian Ocean, western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Great Scallop
Black-lip pearl oysters begin life as a male before changing into a female two or three years later. Females produce millions of eggs, which are fertilized randomly and externally by the males’ sperm, before hatching into free-swimming larvae. The mobile larvae pass through various larval stages for about a month before eventually settling on the seafloor, after metamorphosing into the sessile (immobile) adult form. This species is famous and much sought-after because it occasionally produces prized black pearls.
Pecten maximus WIDTH
Up to 71/2 in (17 cm) HABITAT
Sandy seabeds, at 16–500 ft (5–150 m), commonly 33 ft (10 m)
CLASS BIVALVIA
Atlantic Thorny Oyster Spondylus americanus
DISTRIBUTION
Northeastern Atlantic
OCEAN LIFE
LENGTH
Also known as the king scallop, the great scallop is usually found partly buried in sand. It is one of the few bivalves capable of rapid movement through water, which it achieves using a form of jet propulsion. It claps the two halves of its shell together, which pushes water out of the mantle cavity close to the hinge. It moves forward with its shell gape first, producing jerky movements as it takes successive “bites” of water. These odd movements may be a useful strategy to escape from predators. These edible bivalves are now farmed to meet growing demand.
Up to 41/2 in (11 cm) HABITAT
Rocks to a depth of 460 ft (140 m) Southeast coast of US, Bahamas, Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean
DISTRIBUTION
The Atlantic thorny oyster’s spiny shell protects it from predators. The oyster pictured here is covered with an encrusting red sponge, which provides camouflage. This species is unusual in having a ball-and-socket type hinge joining the two halves of its shell,
rather than the more common toothed hinge seen in many other bivalves. The Atlantic thorny oyster cements itself directly to rocks rather than using byssal threads.
ORDER BIVALVIA
Shipworm Teredo navalis LENGTH
24 in (60 cm) HABITAT
Wood burrows in high-salinity seas and estuaries Coastal waters off North, Central, and South America, and Europe
DISTRIBUTION
Despite its wormlike appearance, the shipworm is a type of clam that has become elongated as an adaptation to its burrowing lifestyle. Its bivalve shell, situated at the anterior end, is very small and ridged. The shipworm uses it with a rocking motion to bore into wooden objects. Outside the shell its body is unprotected, except for a calcareous tube it secretes to line the burrow. These worms damage wooden structures, such as piers, and in the past caused many ships to sink.The burrow entrance is only about the size of a pinhead, but the burrow itself may be over 1/2 in (1 cm) wide, so the extent of an infestation is often underestimated until it is too late. Shipworms change from male to female during their lifetime, and the female form produces many eggs, from which free-swimming larvae hatch. When they mature and settle on a suitable piece of wood, the larvae quickly metamorphose into the adult form and start burrowing.
mollusks ORDER BIVALVIA
Common Piddock Pholas dactylus LENGTH
Up to 6 in (15 cm) across HABITAT
Lower shore to shallow sublittoral DISTRIBUTION South and east coasts of UK, Severn estuary in UK, west coast of France, Mediterranean
anterior beak of elliptical shell
This mollusk has a pronounced “beak” covered in toothlike projections at the front end of its shell. It uses this feature for boring holes into relatively soft substrates, such as mud, chalk, peat, and shale. Like the shipworm (opposite), this piddock relies on its burrows for protection from predation, because the shell does not encase all of its body—its two fused siphons (tubes for eating, breathing, and excretion) trail out behind it. The shell is fragile, elliptical, and covered in a pattern of concentric ridges and radiating lines. If disturbed, the common piddock has an unusual defense strategy: it squirts a luminous blue secretion from its outgoing, or exhalant, siphon. Such bioluminescence is very rare in bivalve mollusks and is seen in only one other of the 14,000 species.
fused siphons
ORDER BIVALVIA
Giant Clam Tridacna gigas LENGTH
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m) HABITAT
Sandy beds of reef flats and shallow lagoons to 65 ft (20 m) DISTRIBUTION Tropical Indo-Pacific from south China seas to northern coasts of Australia, and Nicobar Islands in the west to Fiji in the east
The largest and heaviest of all mollusks is the giant clam. Like other bivalves, it feeds by filtering small food particles
from the water using its ingoing, or inhalant, siphon, which is fringed with small tentacles. However, it differs in obtaining most of its nourishment from zooxanthellae (unicellular algae that live within its tissues)—a type of relationship also associated with coral polyps. The algae have a constant and safe environment in which to live; in return, they provide the clam with essential nutrients, the carbon-based products of photosynthesis. In fact, so dependent is the giant clam on these algae that it will die without them. The adult is sessile (immobile) and its inhalant and exhalant (outgoing) siphons are the only openings in its mantle. Although the scalloped edges
ORDER BIVALVIA
283
ORDER BIVALVIA
Common Edible Cockle
Razor Shell Ensis americanus
Cerastoderma edule
LENGTH
6 in (16 cm)
LENGTH
HABITAT
Up to 2 in (5 cm)
Sandy and muddy shores
HABITAT
Middle and lower shore, 2 in (5 cm) below surface of sand or mud Barents Sea, eastern north Atlantic from Norway to Senegal, West Africa
Atlantic coast of North America, introduced to North Sea
DISTRIBUTION
DISTRIBUTION
This edible bivalve has a robust, ribbed shell and burrows in dense populations just below the surface of sand or mud, filtering organic matter such as plankton from the water. Freeswimming larvae emerge from its fertilized eggs. Adult cockles sink to the sea floor, where they assume a more sedentary lifestyle. of their shell halves are mirror images of one another, larger individuals may be unable to close their shells fully, so their brightly colored mantle and siphons remain constantly exposed. Many giant clams appear iridescent due to an almost continuous covering of purple and blue spots on their mantles, while others look more green or gold, but all have a number of clear spots, or “windows,” that let sunlight filter into the mantle cavity. Fertilization is external and the eggs hatch into free-swimming larvae before settling onto the seabed. The exhalant siphon expels water and at spawning time provides an exit point for the eggs or sperm.
So called because their shells resemble a straight razor, razor shells live in deep, vertical burrows on muddy and soft sandy shores. They are native to the northeast coast of North America, and the free-swimming larval stage is thought to have been introduced to the North Sea in 1978 when a ship emptied its ballast tanks outside the German port of Hamburg. This clam has subsequently spread along the continental coast. In places, it affects local polychaete worm populations, but it is not considered a pest.
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OCEAN LIFE
GIANT CLAM
The largest living mollusk, the giant clam obtains energy by filterfeeding and from photosynthetic algae living in its colorful mantle tissues. During the daytime, it spreads these tissues out to expose the algae to sunlight. Although not carnivorous, the clam does sometimes trap other animals when closing its shell.
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animal life orange foot with greenish tint
CLASS GASTROPODA
Common Limpet Patella vulgata
CLASS GASTROPODA
Top Shell Trochus niloticus LENGTH
DIAMETER
21/2 in (6 cm)
6 in (16 cm)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Rocks on high shore to sublittoral zone
Intertidal and shallow subtidal areas, reef flats to 23 ft (7 m)
conical shell
MUSCULAR FOOT Northeastern Atlantic from Arctic Circle to Portugal
DISTRIBUTION
Abundant on rocks from the high to the low water mark, the common limpet is superbly adapted to shore life. A conical shell protects it from predators and the elements. Limpets living at the low water mark are buffeted by the waves and so require smaller, flatter shells than those living at the high water mark, where wider,
The common limpet’s muscular foot, seen here from below, holds it firmly to its rock, regardless of the strength of the waves.
taller shells allow for better water retention during periods of exposure. Limpets travel slowly during low tide, covering up to 24 in (60 cm) using contractions of their single foot. They graze on algae from rocks using a radula (a rasplike structure), which has teeth reinforced with iron minerals.
Eastern Indian Ocean, western and southern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Easily distinguished from most other gastropods by the conical shape of its spiral shell, the top shell moves slowly over reef flats and coral rubble, feeding on algae. Demand for its flesh and pretty shell has led to declining numbers, especially in the Philippines, due to unregulated harvesting. It has, however, been successfully introduced elsewhere in the Indo-Pacific, such as French Polynesia and the Cook Islands, from where some original sites are being restocked.
CLASS GASTROPODA
Red Abalone Haliotis rufescens LENGTH
6–8 in (15–20 cm) HABITAT
Rocks from low tide mark to 100 ft (30 m) East Pacific coasts from southern Oregon, US to Baja California, Mexico
DISTRIBUTION
The largest of the abalone species, the red abalone is so called because of the brick-red color of its thick, roughly oval shell. There is an arc of
CLASS GASTROPODA
RETURNING HOME
Limpets gradually grind a “scar” into their anchor spot on the rock, to aid their grip and help retain water. A mucus trail leads them back to the spot.
Venus Comb Murex pecten LENGTH
Up to 3 in (8 cm) HABITAT
Tropical warm waters to 650 ft (200 m)
CLASS GASTROPODA
CLASS GASTROPODA
Zebra Nerite
Dog Whelk
Puperita pupa
Nucella lapillus LENGTH
DISTRIBUTION
LENGTH
Up to 1/2 in (1 cm)
Up to 21/2 in (6 cm)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Rocky tide pools
Middle and lower rocky shores
Caribbean, Bahamas, Florida
DISTRIBUTION
Northwestern and northeastern
OCEAN LIFE
Atlantic
The small, rounded, smooth, blackand-white striped shell of the zebra nerite is typical of the species, but in examples from Florida the shell is sometimes more mottled or speckled with black. These gastropods are most active during the day, when they feed on microorganisms such as diatoms and cyanobacteria, but if they become too hot or they are exposed at low tide, they cluster together, withdraw into their shells, and become inactive. This may be a mechanism for preventing excessive water loss. Unusually for gastropods, there are separate males and females of zebra nerites and fertilization of the eggs occurs internally. The males use their penis to deposit sperm into a special storage organ inside the female. Later, she lays a series of small white eggs that hatch into planktonic larvae.
One the most common rocky shore gastropods, the dog whelk has a thick, heavy, sharply pointed spiral shell. The shell’s exact shape depends on its exposure to wave action, and its color depends on diet. Dog whelks are voracious predators, feeding mainly on barnacles and mussels. Once the prey has been located, the whelk uses its radula to bore a hole in the shell of its prey before sucking out the flesh.
DISTRIBUTION
Eastern Indian Ocean and western
Pacific
The tropical carnivorous snail known as the Venus comb has a unique and spectacular shell. There are rows of long, thin spines along its longitudinal ridges, which continue onto the narrow, rodlike, and very elongated siphon canal. The exact function of these spines is unknown, but they are thought to be either for protection or to prevent the snail from sinking into the soft substrate on which it lives. Its body is tall and columnar so that it can lift its cumbersome shell above the ground to move in search of food.
three to five clearly visible holes in the shell, through which it respires and expels waste products. These are filled and replaced with new holes as the abalone increases in size. Sea otters are one of the red abalone’s main predators, along with human divers.
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HALF BURIED
The spines of this Venus comb can be seen sticking out of the sand. The siphon is visible to the right of the picture.
mollusks
287
CLASS GASTROPODA
Tiger Cowrie Cypraea tigris LENGTH
Up to 6 in (15 cm) HABITAT
Low tide to 100 ft (30 m) on coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Indian Ocean, western Pacific
One of the largest cowrie species, the tiger cowrie has a shiny, smooth, domed shell with a long, narrow aperture, and is variously mottled in black, brown, cream, and orange. Extensions of the cowrie’s mantle (its body’s outer, enclosing layer) cover parts of the exterior of the shell. These extensions have numerous projections, or papillae, whose exact function is unknown, but which may increase the surface area for oxygen absorption or provide camouflage of some sort. Tiger cowries are nocturnal creatures, hiding in crevices among the coral during the day and emerging at night to graze on algae. The sexes are separate and fertilization occurs internally. Females exhibit some parental care in that they protect their egg capsules by covering them with their muscular foot until they hatch into larvae, which then enter the plankton to mature.
CLASS GASTROPODA
Giant Triton Charonia tritonis LENGTH
Up to 16 in (40 cm) HABITAT
Coral reef, sandy substrate, intertidal and subtidal zones DISTRIBUTION
Indian Ocean, western and central
Pacific
CLASS GASTROPODA
Common Periwinkle Littorina littorea CLASS GASTROPODA
Flamingo Tongue Cyphoma gibbosum LENGTH
1–11/2 in (3–4 cm) HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Western Atlantic, from North Carolina to Brazil; Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea
The off-white shell of the flamingo tongue cowrie is usually almost completely hidden by the two fleshy, leopard-spotted extensions of its
LENGTH
Up to 1 in (3 cm) HABITAT
Upper shore to sublittoral rocky shores, mud flats, estuaries Coastal waters of northwest Europe; introduced to North America
DISTRIBUTION
The common periwinkle has a black to dark gray, sharply conical shell and slightly flattened tentacles, which in juveniles also have conspicuous black banding. The sexes are separate and fertilization occurs internally. Females release egg capsules, containing two or three eggs,
directly into the water during the spring tides. The eggs hatch into freeswimming larvae that float in the plankton for up to six weeks. After settling and metamorphosing into the adult form, it takes a further two to three years for the adult to fully mature. It feeds mainly on algae, which it rasps from the rocks. Recently, the common periwinkle was accidentally introduced into North America, where its selective grazing of fast-growing algal species has considerably affected the ecology of some rocky shores.
OCEAN LIFE
Coral reefs at about 50 ft (15 m)
body’s outer casing, or mantle. When threatened, however, its distinctive coloration quickly disappears as it withdraws all its soft body parts into its shell for protection. This snail feeds almost exclusively on gorgonian corals, which dominate Caribbean reef communities. Although these corals release chemical defenses to repulse predators, the flamingo tongue cowrie is apparently able to degrade these bioactive compounds and eat the corals without coming to any harm. After mating, the female strips part of a soft coral branch and deposits the egg capsules on it. Each capsule contains a single egg that will hatch into a freeswimming planktonic larva.
This gastropod is one of the very few animals that eats the crown-of-thorns starfish, itself a voracious predator and destroyer of coral reefs. The giant triton is an active hunter that will chase prey, such as starfish, mollusks, and sea stars, once it has been detected. It uses its muscular single foot to hold its victim down while it cuts through any protective covering using its serrated, tonguelike radula; it then releases paralyzing saliva into the body before eating the subdued prey.
288 CLASS GASTROPODA
CLASS GASTROPODA
Three-tooth Cavoline Sea Hare Cavolinia tridentata
Aplysia punctata
LENGTH 1/2
LENGTH
in (1 cm)
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
HABITAT
HABITAT
330–6,500 ft (100–2,000 m); carried in ocean currents DISTRIBUTION
CLASS GASTROPODA
Bubble Shell Bullina lineata LENGTH
1 in (2.5 cm) HABITAT
Sand, reefs to 65 ft (20 m), mainly intertidal; subtidal at range limits Tropical and subtropical waters of Indian Ocean and west Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
The pale spiral shell of the bubble shell (also known as the red-lined bubble shell) has a distinctive pattern of pinkish red lines by which it can be
identified. Its soft body parts are delicate and translucent with a fluorescent blue margin and, in form, reminiscent of the Spanish dancer (opposite), which is a close relative that has lost its shell. If threatened, the bubble shell quickly withdraws into its shell and at the same time regurgitates food, possibly as a defense mechanism to distract predators. The bubble shell is itself a voracious predator, feeding on sedentary polychaete worms. This mollusk is hermaphroditic and produces characteristic spiral white egg masses.
Warm oceanic waters worldwide
This species of sea butterfly has a small, almost transparent, spherical shell with three distinctive, posterior projections. The shell also has two slits through which large extensions of the mantle pass. These brownish “wings” are ciliated and so can create weak water currents as well as aid buoyancy. Sea butterflies are unusual among shelled mollusks in that they can live in open water. Like other members of this group, the three-tooth cavoline produces a mucus web very much larger than itself, which traps planktonic organisms, such as diatoms and the larvae of other species. It eats the web and the trapped food at intervals, then produces a new one. During their lifetime, sea butterflies change first from males into hermaphrodites and then into females.
CLASS GASTROPODA
Shallow water
DISTRIBUTION Northeast Atlantic and parts of the Mediterranean
The sea hare, a type of sea slug, has tentacles reminiscent of a hare’s ears. It has an internal shell about 11/2 in (4 cm) long that is visible only through a dorsal opening in the mantle. If disturbed, it releases purple or white ink. It is not known if this response is a defense mechanism.
CLASS GASTROPODA
Polybranchid
Hermissenda Sea Slug
Cyerce nigricans
Hermissenda crassicornis
LENGTH
Up to 11/2 in (4 cm)
LENGTH
HABITAT
Up to 3 in (8 cm)
Reefs
HABITAT
Mud flats, rocky shores DISTRIBUTION
Western Indian Ocean, western and
central Pacific
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
This colorful sea slug is a herbivore that browses on algae. It has no need of camouflage or a protective shell, as it has two excellent alternative defense strategies. First, it can secrete distasteful mucus, by utilizing substances in the algae it feeds on and secreting them from small microscopic glands over the body. Second, its body is covered with petal-like outgrowths called cerata, spotted and striped above and spotted below, that can be shed if it is attacked by a predator, in the same way as a lizard sheds its tail. This ability to cast off body parts to distract predators is called autonomy. The cerata are also used in respiration, their large collective surface area allowing efficient gas exchange with the surrounding water. The head carries two pairs of sensory organs— the oral tentacles near the mouth and, further back, the olfactory organs (rhinophores). These are retractile and subdivide as the polybranchid matures. They are used to assist in finding food and mates. There is some debate as to whether this sea slug is a separate species or is simply a color variation of a similar mollusk, Cyerce nigra.
CLASS GASTROPODA
Chromodorid Sea Slug Chromodoris lochi LENGTH
11/2 in (4 cm) HABITAT
Reefs
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and subtropical western and
central Pacific
Protected from predators by its bright warning coloration and unpleasant taste, the chromodorid sea slug forages in the open, rather than hiding away
in cracks and crevices. Since it cannot swim, it glides over the tropical reefs on which it lives on its muscular foot, secreting a mucus trail much as terrestrial slugs do. The different species of the genus Chromodoris are distinguished by the pattern of black lines on their backs and the plain color of their gills and rhinophores (a pair of olfactory organs at the head end). The two chromodorid sea slugs pictured here are possibly about to mate. To do so, they must face in opposite directions so that their sexual openings are aligned. As they are hermaphrodites, they both produce sperm, which they exchange during mating, and both later produce fertilized eggs.
Northwest and northeast Pacific
This sea slug, usually known simply as Hermissenda, has an unusual way of deterring predators. It separates the stinging cells from any organism it eats and stores them in the orange-red tips of petal-like tentacles, or cerata, that cover its back. Any creature that touches the cerata is stung. Unlikely though it seems, Hermissenda is used extensively by scientists conducting memory experiments. The animal has an excellent sense of smell that enables it to find its way around mazes to locate food, and it can be “taught” to respond to simple stimuli.
mollusks CLASS GASTROPODA
Spanish Dancer Hexabranchus sanguineus LENGTH
Up to 24 in (60 cm)
exposing its bright colors and possibly startling potential predators. Spanish dancers are specialist predators that feed only on sponges, particularly encrusting species, from which they modify and concentrate certain distasteful compounds in their skin to
HABITAT
Shallow water on coasts and reefs DISTRIBUTION
289
use as another defense against predation. They have external gills for respiration, which are extensively branched and attached to the body wall in distinct pockets and which cannot be retracted. Like all nudibranchs, the Spanish dancer is hermaphroditic, but it requires a partner in order to reproduce.
Parts of tropical Indian Ocean,
west Pacific
external gills
The largest of the nudibranchs is the Spanish dancer—so called because when it swims, the undulating movements of its flattened body are reminiscent of a flamenco dancer. Adults are brightly but variably colored, generally in shades of red, pink, or orange, sometimes mixed with white or yellow. While resting, crawling, or feeding, the lateral edges of its mantle are folded up over its back, displaying the less colorful underside. If disturbed, it will escape by swimming away,
3%!2/3% 4OPROTECTITSEGGCLUSTERFROM PREDATORS THE3PANISHDANCER DEPOSITSWITHITSEGGSSOMEOFTHE TOXINSTHATITPRODUCESFORITSOWN DEFENSE/NCEHATCHED THEFREE SWIMMINGLARVAEJOIN THEPLANKTONUNTIL THEYMATURE7ITH
EGG RIBBON
Each dancer produces several roselike pink egg ribbons about 1½ in (4 cm) across; together these may contain over one million eggs.
OCEAN LIFE
bright coloration
ALIFE SPANOFABOUTAYEAR THEY GROWRAPIDLY SETTLINGONASUITABLE FOODSOURCEWHENTHEYAREREADY TOCHANGEINTOTHEADULTFORM
290 CLASS CEPHALOPODA
CLASS CEPHALOPODA
Dumbo Octopus
Blue-ringed Octopus
Grimpoteuthis plena
Hapalochlaena maculosa
LENGTH
DISTRIBUTION
CLASS CEPHALOPODA
Nautilus Nautilus pompilius WIDTH
Shell up to 8 in (20 cm) HABITAT
Tropical open waters to 1,600 ft (500 m) Eastern Indian Ocean, western Pacific, and Australia to New Caledonia
DISTRIBUTION
The six remaining species of Nautilus belong to a once numerous group of shelled cephalopods that existed from 400 to 65 million years ago. They are often referred to as “living fossils” because they are so little changed from
CLASS CEPHALOPODA
Giant Octopus Enteroctopus dofleini LENGTH
Up to 30 ft (9 m) HABITAT
Bottom dwellers, to 2,500 ft (750 m) DISTRIBUTION
Temperate northwest and northeast
Pacific
OCEAN LIFE
The giant octopus is one of the largest invertebrates as well as one of the most intelligent. It can solve problems, such as negotiating a maze
their ammonoid ancestors. Their shell protects them from predation, while gas trapped in its inner chambers provides buoyancy. The head protrudes from the shell and has up to 90 suckerless tentacles, which are used to capture prey such as shrimp and other crustaceans; the head also features a pair of rudimentary eyes that lack a lens and work on a principle similar to a pinhole camera. The nautilus swims using jet propulsion, drawing water into its mantle cavity and expelling it forcefully through a tubular siphon, which can be directed to propel the nautilus forward, backward, or sideways. Unlike most other cephalopods, nautiluses mature late, at about ten years of age, and produce only about twelve eggs per year. by trial and error, and remember the solution for a long time. It has large, complex eyes with color vision and sensitive suckers that can distinguish between objects by touch alone. It changes color rapidly by contracting or expanding pigmented areas in cells called chromatophores, enabling it to remain camouflaged regardless of background. It also uses its color to convey mood, becoming red if annoyed and pale if stressed. Most cephalopods show little parental care, but female giant octopuses guard their eggs for up to eight months until they hatch. They do not eat during that time, and siphon water over the eggs to keep them clean and aerated.
LENGTH
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
4–8 in (10–20 cm)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Deep water, to 6,500 ft (2,000 m)
Shallow water, rock pools
Northwest Atlantic
Little is known about the Dumbo octopus, as only a few have been recorded. Its common name derives from a pair of unusual, earlike flaps extending from the mantle above its eyes. It has a soft body, an adaptation to its deep-water habitat, and eight arms connected to each other almost to their tips by “webbing.” Its diet includes worms and snails.
Tropical west Pacific and Indian Ocean (all species of Hapalochlaena)
DISTRIBUTION
The most dangerous cephalopod is the small blue-ringed octopus, which produces highly toxic saliva powerful enough to kill a human. To catch prey, it either releases saliva into the water and waits for the poison to take effect, or catches, bites, and injects prey directly. Its bright coloring is unusual for an octopus, and the numerous blue rings covering its body become more iridescent if it is disturbed.
$%&%.3%-%#(!.)37HENTHREATENED AGIANTOCTOPUS SQUIRTSACLOUDOFPURPLEINKOUT THROUGHITSSIPHONINTOTHEWATER ANDATTHESAMETIMEMOVES BACKWARDRAPIDLY USINGJETPROPULSION 0OTENTIALPREDATORS ARELEFTCONFUSED ANDDISORIENTEDIN ACLOUDOFINK4HE OCTOPUSCANREPEAT THISPROCESSSEVERAL TIMESINQUICK SUCCESSION
A QUICK GETAWAY
This giant octopus is making a rapid retreat, expelling an ink jet as a defense mechanism. The jet also propels the octopus backward forcefully.
mollusks
291
CLASS CEPHALOPODA
Australian Giant Cuttlefish Sepia apama LENGTH
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m) HABITAT
Shallow water over reefs DISTRIBUTION
Coastal Australian waters
Of about 100 cuttlefish species, the Australian giant cuttlefish is the largest. Like all cuttlefish, it has a flattened body and an internal shell, known as the cuttle and familiar to many as budgerigar food. This species lives for up to three years and gathers in huge numbers to breed. Males have elaborate courtship displays, which involve hovering in the water while making rapid, kaleidoscopic changes of color, as the male shown here is doing. When a female is receptive, the male deposits a sperm package in a pouch under her mouth. This later bursts, releasing sperm and fertilizing her 200 or more golf-ball-sized eggs, which she then deposits on a hard substrate. The eggs hatch into miniature adults after several months.
CLASS CEPHALOPODA
CLASS CEPHALOPODA
CLASS CEPHALOPODA
Common Squid
Glass Squid
Vampire Squid
Loligo vulgaris
Teuthowenia pellucida
Vampyroteuthis infernalis
DISTRIBUTION
LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 12 in (30 cm)
1/2 –11/2 in
HABITAT
HABITAT
60–800 ft (20–250 m)
Midwater
Eastern Atlantic, Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
LENGTH
Circumglobal in southern temperate
waters
A tubular body and a small, rodlike internal skeleton are characteristic features of all species of squid. They also have very large eyes relative to body size. The common squid is an inshore, commercially important species that has been harvested for centuries and is probably the best known of all cephalopods. It is a fast swimmer that actively hunts its prey, such as crustaceans and small fish. Once caught, the squid passes the prey to its mouth, where it is dismembered by powerful, beaklike jaws.
Up to 15 in (38 cm)
(1.4–3.8 cm)
Like many mollusks, juvenile glass squid live in the plankton, then descend to deeper, darker levels as they mature. The presence of light organs, called photophores, in the tips of their arms and in the eye may help in locating a mate. Sexually mature females are also thought to produce a chemical attractant, or pheromone.
HABITAT
1,600–5,000 ft (500–1,500 m), oxygen-poor water DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and temperate oceans
worldwide
CLASS POLYPLACOPHORA
Lined Chiton Tonicella lineata LENGTH
11/2 in (3.5 cm) HABITAT
Intertidal and subtidal zones, common on rocky surfaces Temperate waters of northeast and northwest Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
coralline algae. The lined chiton’s mantle extends around the shell on all sides, forming an unusually smooth, leathery “girdle” that helps to hold its eight shell-plates together. It has a large, muscular foot, which it uses to move over rocks and, when still, to grip on to them in much the same way as limpets do. At low tide, it remains stationary to avoid water loss. Its head is small and eyeless. The sexes are separate and it reproduces by releasing its gametes into the water.
OCEAN LIFE
Chitons are mollusks with shells made up of eight arching and overlapping plates. The lined chiton is so called because of a series of zigzagging blue or red lines on its shell. The shell is usually pinkish in color, which provides good camouflage as this chiton grazes from rocks that are covered with encrusting pink
This is the only squid that spends its entire life in deep, oxygen-poor water. Like many deep-living creatures, the vampire squid is bioluminescent and has light organs, or photophores, on the tips of its arms and at the base of its fins. If threatened, it flashes these lights and writhes around in the water, finally ejecting mucus that sparkles with blue luminescent light. When the lights go out, the vampire squid will have vanished. Its predators include sea lions and deep-diving whales.
292
animal life
ARTHROPODS THE ANIMALS THAT HAVE ACHIEVED the greatest diversity on Earth are the arthropods, although relatively few can live in KINGDOM Animalia salt water. They include insects, spiders, and scorpions, but PHYLUM Arthropoda most marine arthropods are crustaceans, such as crabs, shrimp, SUBPHYLA 5 and barnacles. Marine arthropods, particularly larval stages, SPECIES More than 1.1 million form most of the ocean’s zooplankton—the community of tiny, drifting life forms that support all oceanic food chains. Like land arthropods, all marine forms have an external skeleton, segmented body, and jointed appendages, permitting some, such as robber crabs, to live on land as well as in water. Spiders and insects, although rarely fully marine, may live inshore and on coasts. DOMAIN Eucarya
APPENDAGES
ANATOMY
SEASHORE INSECTS
Unlike many insects, the springtail is not divided into a head, thorax, and abdomen. Instead, its thorax has three segments bearing three pairs of legs, and the abdomen has six segments. digestive gland
heart
This spotted cleaner shrimp has jointed walking appendages. Two furthers pairs of jointed appendages, which are located on its head, are modified into sensory antennae.
Although arthropods may look very different from one another, they all have an external skeleton (exoskeleton), which is either thin and flexible or rigid and toughened by deposits of calcium carbonate. The body is segmented and has a variable number of jointed appendages—some are used for walking and swimming, while others are modified into claws and antennae or adapted for feeding. Muscles are attached across the joints to facilitate movement. Most of the body cavity is hollow; this space, called the hemocoel, contains the internal organs and a fluid—hemolymph—that is the equivalent to vertebrate blood, which is pumped around the body by the heart in an open circulatory system. Most marine forms use gills for respiration and have well-developed sense organs. sensory antenna
stomach
merus
SPIDER FEATURES
Although it is called a crab and has a hinged carapace, this horseshoe crab is a close relative of spiders, ticks, and mites. Like them, it has four pairs of jointed legs.
dactylus
carpus eye
propodus
claw ischium coxa basis
swimmeret tail fan (telson)
nerve cluster (ganglion)
forward and backward movement
point of attachment to body
movements up and down
ARTHROPOD ANATOMY
ARTHROPOD LIMB
Lobsters have a protective shell called a carapace, large pincers, and well-developed walking appendages. The hemocoel contains the internal organs.
Walking appendages, such as this crab’s limb, comprise rigid sections linked with movable joints. The joints move in different planes, allowing extensive movement.
FILTER-FEEDING LIMBS
At high tide, barnacles feed by extending their long, feathery appendages from their “shell” and sweeping the water for plankton and detritus.
OCEAN LIFE
walking appendage
SCAVENGING IN THE SAND
As the tide retreats, this sand bubbler crab emerges to feed on the microscopic material trapped between sand grains.
FEEDING Among crustaceans, feeding is extremely varied. Many crabs are scavengers that feed on dead and decaying organic matter. They are therefore vital in helping to recycle nutrients. Others are hunters and have robust claws to stun (mantis shrimp) or crush (lobsters) their prey before tearing it apart and consuming it. Many small planktonic crustaceans, such as cyclopoids and other copepods, are filter feeders that make effective use of various appendages, including long antennae, to create water currents that waft food particles toward their mouths. Most barnacles, although they are attached to rocks, feed in a similar way, using their limbs to collect food. A few crustaceans are parasitic (some isopods, copepods, and the barnacle Sacculina) and obtain all their nourishment from their host. The shoreline is an ideal place for insects, such as kelp flies, that feed by releasing enzymes onto rotting seaweed and then taking in the resultant digested material. Farther inland, among the dunes, there is more vegetation, so spiders and pollen- and nectar-feeding insects start to appear.
HARD SKELETON AND JOINTED LIMBS
These tiny porcelain crabs, less than 1 in (2.5 cm) wide, are filter feeders. They have typical arthropod features, such as a hard exoskeleton covering a segmented body, and jointed limbs.
arthropods
GROWTH
HUMAN IMPACT
Once crustaceans take on their adult form, they can only grow by molting and replacing their exoskeleton with a larger one. This process, called ecdysis, is controlled by hormones and occurs repeatedly during adult life. The exoskeleton is produced from the layer of cells situated immediately below it. Before a molt starts, the exoskeleton detaches from this cell layer and the space in between fills with molting fluid. Enzymes within this fluid weaken the exoskeleton so that it eventually splits at the weakest point, often somewhere along the back. The new exoskeleton is soft and wrinkled, so it needs to harden and expand. Marine arthropods absorb water rapidly after molting to expand their new protective covering. They then remain hidden for a few days, as they are more vulnerable to predation until their exoskeleton hardens.
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293
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THE MOLTING SEQUENCE
This sequence shows a harlequin shrimp molting. The exoskeleton has split just behind the neck joint, allowing the shrimp to pull out its head. The rest of its body quickly follows as the split enlarges. It takes only a few minutes for the shrimp to free itself completely, after which it rests for a few seconds. The new exoskeleton is soft, since it must be flexible to buckle up to fit inside the older, smaller skeleton. It stretches to accommodate the increased size of the shrimp. Complete hardening of the new exoskeleton will take about two days.
The old exoskeleton splits along the back behind the harlequin shrimp’s head. It eases out backward.
1
The shrimp emerges further and struggles to free itself from the old exoskeleton.
2
Molting is complete, and the old exoskeleton lies beside the shrimp, as the animal rests.
3
OCEAN LIFE
294
LIFESTYLES
PARASITISM
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Sea spiders are so called because of their resemblance to land spiders, but their exact relationship to spiders is still not clear.
Some arthropods live closely with other species. This fish is being parasitized by an isopod, which is related to woodlice. There are two isopods, one under each eye, feeding on tissue fluid to the detriment of the fish.
All marine arthropods are freeliving for at least part of their lives. Some, such as crabs, have planktonic larvae that sink to the sea floor and become bottomliving, or benthic, as they mature. They tend to live alone unless seeking a partner to breed with, and may defend territory. COMMENSALISM Others, such as krill and This crab is camouflaged by a sea squirt in copepods, live in vast a commensal relationship. The crab benefits but the sea squirt neither gains nor loses. swarms, traveling hundreds of yards up and down the water column each day to feed (see p.221). Adult barnacles remain anchored to one spot—that is, they are sessile—but they also aggregate in large numbers on rocky shores where living conditions are most favorable. Deep-sea arthropod species are not well known, but many have cryptic red or black coloration to make themselves invisible, as opposed to krill, which have light organs and exhibit bioluminescence. A few arthropods live in close association with other species. Sometimes both partners benefit from a relationship (mutualism), sometimes only one has an advantage (commensalism), and sometimes one gains at some cost to the other (parasitism).
REPRODUCTION AND LIFE CYCLES
egg mass on underside of female crab
In most crustaceans, the sexes are separate, fertilization is predominantly internal, and the eggs must be laid in water. Some females store sperm and then let it flow over their eggs as they release them. Others protect their eggs by carrying them around, and keep them healthy by continually wafting water over them. On hatching, the larvae join the zooplankton, and pass through various stages before maturing into adults. Barnacles are both male and female (hermaphroditic) but only function as one sex at a time. The male has a long, extendable penis and mates with all neighboring females within reach. In horseshoe crabs, fertilization occurs externally. Males and females pair up, the males fertilize the eggs as the females lay them in the sand, and then both sexes abandon them.
ARTHROPOD CLASSIFICATION
OCEAN LIFE
Here, the arthropods are split into five subphyla—Crustacea, Pycnogonida, Chelicerata, Hexapoda, and the non-marine Myriapoda (centipedes and millipedes—not described below). All contain land and freshwater species except the exclusively marine Pycnogonida. CRUSTACEANS Subphylum Crustacea
SEA SPIDERS Subphylum Pycnogonida
50,000 species
1,000 species
This group includes the familiar crabs, lobsters, shrimp, crayfish, and barnacles, as well as the smaller copepods, isopods, and krill. Most crustaceans have two pairs of antennae and only two body segments: the cephalothorax, fused together from the head and the thorax; and the abdomen. Paired appendages vary greatly—some are sensory, while others are adapted for walking or swimming; sometimes there is also a large pair of claws.
All members of this group are small and spiderlike with a leg span of between 1 mm (1/32 in) and 20 in (50 cm). Many species have a unique pair of legs, called ovigers, which are situated in front of the first pair of walking legs. The females use them for grooming, courtship, and also to transfer eggs to the ovigers of the male, where they remain until they hatch. Sea spiders are common in intertidal areas but they are rarely seen due to their excellent camouflage.
CRAB MOTHER AND LARVA
A velvet crab (above) carries eggs beneath her body until they hatch. The hatchlings enter a planktonic larval stage called a zoea (left). This molts four to seven times before it becomes a megalops larva, then once again to become an adult crab.
CHELICERATES Subphylum Chelicerata
INSECTS Subphylum Hexapoda
70,000 species
950,000 species
Spiders, scorpions, ticks, mites, and horseshoe crabs belong to this group. A few species of spiders live in the intertidal zone, and some types of ticks and mites are either free-living or parasitic in marine habitats. The horseshoe crabs (class Merostomata) are completely marine. Like spiders, they have four pairs of walking legs and their body comprises two parts, called the prosoma and opisthosoma. In horseshoe crabs, the prosoma contains most of the body organs, and the opisthosoma has most of the musculature and the gill books, which are used for respiration and locomotion. What makes this species unique is the hinged carapace that protects the body and the long, tail-like telson, which is used to right itself if the crab is accidentally inverted.
By far the largest group within the Hexapoda is the insects—the largest of all animal groups. It includes beetles, flies, ants, and bees. Most insects have compound eyes and three distinct body segments—the head, the thorax with its three pairs of walking appendages, and the abdomen. Many species also have wings. Many insects live in coastal areas, but only a few live on the shore. Only one type of insect is truly marine—the marine skater, Halobates, a type of “true bug” (order Hemiptera). There are five species of this insect, and they spend their entire life on the ocean. However, they require a solid object, such as a floating feather or lump of tar, on which to lay their eggs.
arthropods SUBPHYLUM PYCNOGONIDA
SUBPHYLUM CHELICERATA
Giant Sea Spider
American Horseshoe Crab
Colossendeis australis LENGTH 10 in ( 25 cm) (leg-span) WEIGHT
Not recorded
HABITAT
Bottom
Limulus polyphemus LENGTH
Up to 24 in
(60 cm) WEIGHT
dweller
Up to 11 lb (5 kg)
Sandy or muddy bays to 100 ft (30 m)
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Antarctic shelf and slope
Unlike most sea spiders, which have a leg-span of less than 1 in (2.5 cm), the giant sea spider has a huge legspan of about 10 in (25 cm). It has a large proboscis through which it sucks its food, but its tiny body is so small that the sex organs and parts of its digestive system are situated in the tops of the legs. Sea spiders are somewhat unusual among arthropods in that they exhibit parental care, the males having a modified pair of legs to carry the eggs until they hatch.
Western Atlantic and Gulf Coast from southern Maine to the Yucatán Peninsula
DISTRIBUTION
Despite its name, the American horseshoe crab is more closely related to spiders than to crabs. It is mainly active at night and scavenges anything it can find, including small worms, bivalves, and algae. Its horseshoeshaped, greenish-brown outer shell, or carapace, is for protection, and adults have few predators. It has six pairs of appendages: the first pair is used for feeding; the other five are for walking.
The crab’s five platelike “book” gills each contain many membranes, like the pages of a book, and are situated toward the tail. As well as being used for respiration, the gills are also used for propulsion when swimming. They can also absorb water, which helps the crab to fill its new shell after it has shed the old one. Its long, rigid tail is used for steering and for righting itself. The reproductive cycle is closely linked to the spring and fall high tides (especially the spring tides in the northern part of the range) and the lunar cycle. At full moon, the adults gather in large numbers on sandy beaches to breed. Females lay up to 20,000 eggs in a nest near the hightide mark, providing a vital food source for birds and other marine creatures. After hatching, the young remain hidden in the sand for safety. They emerge some weeks later at high tide and take to the water until they molt for the first time, after which they look like small adults and start to live on the sea floor.
295
HUMAN IMPACT
-%$)#!, 2%3%!2#( )FTHE!MERICANHORSESHOECRAB ISINJURED SOMEOFITSBLOODCELLS FORMACLOT WHICHKILLSHARMFUL BACTERIATHATAREALSODANGEROUSTO HUMANS)NORDERTOEXPLOITTHIS PROPERTYFORHUMANBENEFIT CRABS ARECOLLECTEDFROMSHALLOWWATERS ONTHE!TLANTICCOASTOF.ORTH !MERICADURINGTHESUMMER MONTHS2ESEARCHERSTHENREMOVE ABOUTPERCENTOFTHEBLOOD FROMEACHCRAB&ROMTHISTHEY EXTRACTAPROTEINTHATISUSEDTO DETECTBACTERIALCONTAMINATION INDRUGS VACCINES ANDOTHER MEDICALPRODUCTSTHATAREGIVEN INTRAVENOUSLY"LEEDINGTHE CRABSISNOTFATALTOTHEM AND AFTERWARDTHEYARERETURNED TOTHESEATORECOVER
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Water Flea Evadne nordmanni LENGTH 1/32 in WEIGHT
(1 mm)
Not recorded
Open waters, to depths of 6,500 ft (2,000 m)
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Temperate and cool waters worldwide
The water flea feeds on planktonic organisms and is itself food for larger animals. It has a conspicuous eye and feathery swimming appendages, which are modified antennae. In spring, unfertilized eggs that have been nourished in a brood chamber by the female hatch as females. In fall, males and females are produced in the same way. A large egg is also produced sexually, which overwinters and then invariably develops into a female. large eye
OCEAN LIFE
feathery swimming appendage
296
animal life SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Cyclopoid Copepod
Gooseneck Barnacle
Oithona similis
Pollicipes polymerus LENGTH 1/ –3/ in 54 32
LENGTH
(0.5–2.5 mm)
HABITAT
Surface waters to a depth of 500 ft (150 m)
Intertidal zone of rocky shores
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic, Mediterranean, Southern Ocean, southern Indian and Pacific oceans
DISTRIBUTION
Copepods make up over 70 percent of zooplankton, and this one of the most abundant, widespread species. As the name suggests, cyclopoid copepods have a single, central eye, which is light sensitive. These arthropods also have a T-shaped, shrimplike body that tapers toward the rear and bears six pairs of swimming limbs. Jerky movements of its limbs sweep food particles efficiently toward the mouth. Females can be recognized when carrying egg sacs attached to their abdomens. As part of the zooplankton, copepods of this genus are a vital element of oceanic food chains. They feed on marine algae and bacteria and in turn are an important source of protein for many ocean-dwelling animals. Every night cyclopoid copepods migrate from a depth of about 500 ft (150 m) to the surface layers of the ocean to feed. This daily journey, which is undertaken by many marine creatures, is one of the largest mass movements of animals on Earth.
So called because of its resemblance to a goose neck and head, the gooseneck barnacle forms dense colonies in crevices on rocky shores with strong waves. Barnacles anchor themselves to rocks by a tough, flexible stalk (peduncle), which also contains the ovaries. This is actually their “head” end. Once the barnacle has attached itself to an object it secretes a series of pale plates at the end of its stalk, forming a shell around its featherlike legs, which comb through the water for food. The legs face away from the sea, enabling the barnacle to feed by filtering out particles of detritus from returning tidal water as it funnels past them through cracks in the rocks. These barnacles become sexually mature at about five years of age and may live for up to 20 years. The larval stage is free-living but depends on sea currents for its transport and survival. Colonies of gooseneck barnacle are susceptible to the damaging effects of oil pollution and they recover only slowly from disturbance.
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Acorn Barnacle Semibalanus balanoides LENGTH
Up to 1/2 in (1.5 cm) diameter HABITAT
Intertidal zone of rocky shores Northwest and northeast Atlantic, Pacific coast of North America
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Up to 3 in (8 cm)
HABITAT
Eastern Pacific coast of North America, from Canada to Baja California, Mexico
Like all adult barnacles, the adult acorn barnacle remains fixed in one place once it has anchored itself to a site. The free-swimming juveniles pass through several larval stages before molting into a form that can detect both other acorn barnacles and suitable anchoring sites. Once a larva fixes itself to a rock, using cement produced by glands in its antennae, it molts again. It then secretes six gray calcareous plates, forming a protective cone that looks rather like a miniature volcano. Four smaller, movable plates
at the top of the cone open, allowing the acorn barnacle to feed. It does this when the tide is in by waving its modified legs, called cirri, in the water to filter out food. When the tide is out, the plates are closed to prevent the barnacle from drying out. Acorn barnacles are hermaphrodites that possess both male and female sexual organs, but they function as either a male or a female. They do not shed their eggs and sperm into the water; instead they use extendable penises, to transfer sperm to receptive neighbors.
PEOPLE
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arthropods SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Giant Mussel Shrimp Peacock Gigantocypris muelleri Mantis Shrimp LENGTH 1/ –3/ in 2 4
(1.4–1.8 cm)
Odontodactylus scyallarus LENGTH
HABITAT
Up to 6 in (15 cm)
Planktonic, intermediate to deep sea DISTRIBUTION
HABITAT
Warm water near reefs with sandy, gravelly, or shelly bottoms
Atlantic, Southern Ocean, western
Indian Ocean DISTRIBUTION
Indian and Pacific oceans
The body of the giant mussel shrimp is totally enclosed within its carapace, so that its seven pairs of limbs are almost hidden from view. It has large, mirror eyes with parabolic-shaped reflectors that focus light on to a flat plate in its center. It is planktonic, but lives at greater depth than many forms of plankton, usually below 650 ft (200 m), where it feeds on detritus sinking down from above. The picture shows a large female carrying embryos, which are clearly visible through the carapace.
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Sea Slater Ligia oceanica LENGTH
Up to 11/4 in (3 cm) HABITAT
Coasts with rocky substrata DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic coasts of northwestern
Europe
Commonly found under stones and in rock crevices, the sea slater is a seashore-dwelling relative of the woodlouse. It lives in the splash zone, but can survive periods of immersion in salt water. Its head, which has a pair of welldeveloped compound eyes and very long antennae, is not markedly separated from its
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Sand Hopper LENGTH 1/16 –3/8 in
(2–10 mm)
HABITAT
Splash zone of sandy shores DISTRIBUTION Atlantic coasts of northeastern Canada and northwestern Europe
uropod
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Antarctic Krill Euphausia superba LENGTH
Up to 2 in (5 cm) HABITAT
Planktonic
DISTRIBUTION
Southern Ocean
All oceans contain vast numbers of krill—small, shrimplike, planktonic crustaceans that live in open waters. This species lives in the subantarctic waters of the Southern Ocean, where
created by a special, saddlelike hingejoint in these legs, which acts like a spring. The peacock mantis shrimp can smash the shells of gastropods and crabs and tackles prey larger than itself. It excavates U-shaped burrows or makes crevices in rocks or coral to live in. After hatching, its larvae enter the plankton, where they develop over a few weeks before drifting down toward the sea floor to make their own burrows.
it forms a vital link in the food chain, being taken in vast quantities by baleen whales, seals, and various fish. Krill rise to the surface at night to feed on phytoplankton, algae, and diatoms. For safety they sink to greater depths during the day. The feathery appearance of this species is due to its gills, which, unusually, are carried outside the carapace. Their filamentous structure increases the surface area available for gaseous exchange. Antarctic krill also have large light organs, called photophores. The light is thought to help them group together. They spawn in spring, during which females may release several broods of up to 8,000 eggs.
antenna
Amphipod crustaceans, such as the sand hopper, live in large numbers in the splash zone of any shore where there is rotting seaweed. Their life cycle takes about 12 months and the female usually produces only one clutch of eggs, which she keeps in a brood pouch, where they hatch after one to three weeks. The young leave the pouch about a week later when their mother molts. Sand hoppers are also known as sand fleas because they move in the same way and have similar laterally compressed bodies.
OCEAN LIFE
Orchestia gammarella
body, which is flattened, about twice as long as it is broad, and ends in two forked projections called uropods. As adults, sea slaters have six pairs of walking legs until their final molt, after which they have seven. The sea slater is not generally seen during the day unless it is disturbed, and it emerges from its hiding place only at night to feed on detritus and brown seaweed. Sea slaters mature at about two years of age and usually breed only once before dying.
A relative of shrimp and lobsters, the brightly colored peacock mantis shrimp is a voracious predator. Its large, mobile, compound eyes have sophisticated stereoscopic and color vision that includes some ultraviolet shades. It uses sight when hunting, waiting quietly, like the praying mantis, for its unsuspecting prey to come within reach, then striking using its powerful, clublike second pair of legs with immense speed—about 75 mph (120 km/h)—and force (up 100 times its own weight). Such power is
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animal life SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Deep Sea Red Prawn Common Prawn Acanthephyra pelagica
Palaemon serratus LENGTH
LENGTH
Not recorded
Up to 41/4 in (11 cm)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Rock pools among seaweeds and lower parts of estuaries
Deep water
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic
In the low light levels of the deep ocean, red appears black, making the deep sea red prawn invisible to potential predators. Its hard outer casing, or exoskeleton, is thinner and more flexible than that of shallowwater crustaceans, which prevents collapse under the immense water pressure of the ocean depths. The flesh of this prawn is oily to aid buoyancy. It uses its first three pairs of limbs to feed on small copepods. The remaining five pairs of limbs, the pereiopods, are used for locomotion. Gills attached to the tops of the legs are used for respiration.
Eastern Atlantic from Denmark to Mauritania, Mediterranean, Black Sea
DISTRIBUTION
The common prawn has a semitransparent body, making its internal organs visible, and is marked with darker bands and spots of brownish red. As with many other species of prawn, its shell extends forward between its stalked eyes to form a stiff, slightly upturned projection called a rostrum. This feature has a unique structure by which the common prawn can be distinguished from all other members of the same genus. The rostrum curves upward, splitting in two at the tip, where it has several toothlike projections on the lower and upper surfaces. To either side of the rostrum there is a very long antenna that can sense any danger close by and is also used to detect food. Of the prawn’s five pairs of legs, the rear three pairs are used for walking, while the front two pairs are pincered and used for eating. Attached to the abdomen is a series of smaller limbs called swimmerets that the
HUMAN IMPACT
02!7.&!2-).' .EARLYALLTHEWORLDSFARMED PRAWNSCOMEFROMDEVELOPING COUNTRIESSUCHAS4HAILAND #HINA "RAZIL "ANGLADESH AND%CUADOR WHICHUSE CHEMICAL INTENSIVEFARMING TOMEETDEMAND-ORE ENVIRONMENTALLYFRIENDLY TECHNIQUESARENOWBEING ENCOURAGED SHARED RESOURCES
Fishermen in Honduras fish for wild prawns in a lagoon shared with prawn farmers.
prawn uses to swim. For a sudden, backward movement, the prawn flicks its tail. Females produce and look after about 4,000 eggs until they hatch into larvae. The larvae float among the plankton until they mature. pincered leg
tail fan, or telson
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Anemone Shrimp Periclimenes brevicarpalis LENGTH
1 in (2.5 cm) HABITAT
Shallow water reefs
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
Indian Ocean, western Pacific
Nestling among the tentacles of an anemone, the anemone shrimp is safe from attack by predators. It rarely wanders far from its host, surviving by scavenging scraps that the anemone cannot eat. The shrimp may benefit the anemone by removing excess food particles as well as any waste it produces. This type of relationship is called commensalism: one individual in the partnership profits from the liaison and the other comes to no harm. Removed from its host, this shrimp is defenseless. The anemone shrimp belongs to the same family (Palaeomonidae) as the common prawn (above) and so they have several features in common. These include a pair of long, sensory antennae used to sense danger and detect food and a rostrum (the elongated projection of the shell from between the eyes). The anemone shrimp is almost completely transparent, with a few purple and white spots.
arthropods SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Spiny Lobster
Common Lobster
Panulirus argus
Homarus gammarus LENGTH
LENGTH
24 in (60 cm)
Up to 3 ft (1 m), typically 24 in (60 cm)
HABITAT
Coral reefs in deep water DISTRIBUTION
HABITAT
Rocky coasts
Western Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico,
Eastern Atlantic, North Sea, Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Caribbean Sea
Being both nocturnal and migratory, the spiny lobster has excellent navigational skills. It can establish its position in relation to Earth’s magnetic field and then follow a particular route as well as any homing pigeon. This lobster prefers warm
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Reef Hermit Crab Dardanus megistos WIDTH (LEG-SPAN)
Up to 12 in (30 cm) HABITAT
Near-shore tropical reefs
DISTRIBUTION
Indian and Pacific oceans
Like other hermit crabs, the reef hermit crab uses a “borrowed” shell to protect its hindquarters, being unable to make its own carapace. When it grows too big for its current shell, it simply looks for an unused larger one. It is while switching from one shell to
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Robber Crab Birgus latro LENGTH
Up to 24 in (60 cm) across HABITAT
Rock crevices and sandy burrows DISTRIBUTION
oceans
Tropical waters of Indian and Pacific
water and so remains in the shallows in summer before migrating in groups to deeper water in winter by walking in single file across the sea floor. It lacks the large claws of the common lobster (right) but is well protected from most predators by the sharp spines that cover its carapace. the next that the reef hermit crab is most vulnerable, as it risks exposing its soft, rather asymmetrical abdomen to predators. There are about 500 species of hermit crabs worldwide—the reef hermit crab lives in shallow-water tropical reef habitats, but some species live on land. The reef hermit crab is a scavenger rather than a hunter, and drags itself over the seafloor looking for bits of animal matter and algae, tearing apart any carcasses that it finds with its dextrous mouthparts. It may attach stinging anemones to its shell as protection from predators. The robber crab, or coconut crab, is the largest terrestrial arthropod. An anomuran, like the hermit and porcelain crabs, it has evolved to look similar to brachyurans, the group to which most other crabs belong, but differs in having long antennae and only three pairs of walking legs instead of four. It lives on oceanic islands and offshore inlets. It scavenges but will also eat fruit and can even smash into coconuts using its powerful claws. Adults live and mate on land, but females release their eggs into water.
299
In life, the upper surface of the common lobster is blue mottled with yellow, while its underside is more yellowish. Individuals weigh up to 11 lb (5 kg). It has large, differently sized claws: the smaller one has sharper edges and is used for cutting prey, while the larger one is used for crushing. It lives in holes and crevices on the sea bed. The common lobster is commercially important and in danger of overexploitation because it matures slowly, not beginning to breed until it is about six years old.
crushing claw cutting claw
eye stalk
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Porcelain Crab single large claw
Petrolisthes lamarckii WIDTH (SHELL)
Up to 3/4 in (2 cm) HABITAT
Pools on rocky beaches and shorelines Indian Ocean, Pacific coast of Australia, western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
The flat, rounded body of the porcelain crab allows it to slip easily into small rock crevices to hide. However, if it becomes trapped by a predator or stuck beneath a rock, it can shed one of its claws in order to escape, and a new one will grow over time. This crab’s abdomen is folded under its body, but it can be unfolded and moved like a paddle when swimming.
Nodose Box Crab Calappa angusta LENGTH
Not recorded HABITAT
Offshore to depths of 50–650 ft (15–200 m) DISTRIBUTION
Western Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico,
Caribbean Sea
Found in the warm waters around the Caribbean, the nodose box crab is a true crab with a small abdomen that is tucked away underneath the body and four pairs of legs. This species may be recognized by the rows of nodules that radiate from behind its eyes across the upper surface of its yellowish shell, or carapace.
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Japanese Spider Crab Macrocheira kaempferi WIDTH (SHELL)
Up to
141/2 in (37 cm) Deep-water vents and holes to depths of 160–1,000 ft (50–300 m)
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Pacific Ocean near Japan
OCEAN LIFE
Not only is the giant Japanese spider crab the largest of all crabs, with a leg-span of up to 13 ft (4 m) and weighing 35–44 lb (16–20 kg), it may also be the longest living, surviving for up to 100 years. Living in the deep, cold waters around Japan, it moves slowly across the ocean floor on its spiderlike legs, scavenging for food.
PORCELAIN CRAB
The porcelain crab uses its flat body to crawl out of reach of predators. Here, the tentacles of an anemone provide a secure retreat for a porcelain crab in the Andaman Sea in the northern Indian Ocean. The mouthparts of the crab fan out and trap plankton, which it then brushes into its mouth.
302
animal life SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Long-legged Spider Crab Macropodia rostrata LENGTH
Up to 1 in (2.5 cm) HABITAT
Lower shore, usually not beyond 165 ft (50 m) Northeastern Atlantic from southern Norway to Morocco, Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Also called the decorator crab because it camouflages itself using fragments of seaweed and sponges, the longlegged spider crab is covered in
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
hook-shaped hairs that hold its disguise in place, enabling it to blend in with the seaweed among which it lives. This crab has a triangular-shaped carapace that extends forward between the eyes into an eighttoothed projection called a rostrum. Its spiderlike legs are at least twice as long as its body and can be used, somewhat ineffectively, for swimming. The long-legged spider crab feeds on small shellfish, algae, small worms, and detritus. Breeding occurs year-round on Atlantic coasts, but takes place between March and September in the Mediterranean. The male transfers sperm to the female using its first pair of abdominal legs. The female carries the eggs until they hatch into larvae that live in the plankton.
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Edible Crab
Pea Crab
Cancer pagurus
Pinnotheres pisum LENGTH
Up to 6 in (16 cm)
Males 1/3 in (8 mm); females 1/2 in (14 mm)
Intertidal zone to 330 ft (100 m), in rock pools and muddy sand offshore
Spotted Reef Crab Carpilius maculatus LENGTH
About 31/2 in (9 cm) HABITAT
Shoreline to 33 ft (10 m), inshore reefs DISTRIBUTION
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Carcinus maenas LENGTH
Up to 21/2 in (6 cm)
HABITAT
Intertidal zone to 500 ft (150 m)
DISTRIBUTION
Northeastern Atlantic and North Sea; introduced to parts of the Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
The oval carapace of the edible crab has a characteristically “scalloped” or “piecrust” edge around the front and sides. Its huge pincers are distinctively black-tipped, while the body is purple-brown in small individuals and reddish brown in larger ones. Edible crabs breed year-round, the females incubating their eggs for seven to eight months. This crab is caught in large numbers and is highly valued as a luxury food.
Typically about the size of a pea, the tiny pea crab is usually found inside the shells of the common mussel. Protected from predators in the mantle cavity of its host, it feeds on any plankton that becomes trapped on the mussel’s gills as water passes over them. Whether the presence of this guest is harmful to the mussel is unclear. Female pea crabs are substantially larger than males and have an almost translucent carapace through which their pink reproductive organs are visible. Males have harder, yellowish brown carapaces that protect them during the breeding season, which runs from April to October. During this time, males leave the safety of their host’s shell and swim around looking for females with which to mate. In regions where shellfish are harvested commercially, the pea crab is considered a pest.
HABITAT
Intertidal zone to 200 ft (60 m), all substrates; estuaries
Eastern Atlantic from northwestern Europe to West Africa, Mediterranean
Northeastern Atlantic from Norway to West Africa; introduced elsewhere
DISTRIBUTION
black eye on short eye stalk
mouth
Indian Ocean and western Pacific
Common Shore Crab
LENGTH HABITAT
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
The conspicuous coloring of the spotted reef or coral crab is highly distinctive. Its smooth, light brown carapace has two large red spots behind each eye, three across the middle, and either two or four at the rear. Between the eyes the carapace has four small, rounded projections, which are also characteristic of the species. It is a nocturnal, slow-moving crab that uses its disproportionately large claws to feed on corals, snails, and other small marine creatures.
The common shore crab tolerates a wide range of salt concentrations and temperatures and so can live in salt marshes and estuaries as well as along the shoreline. Its dark green carapace has five marked serrations on the edge behind the eyes. This opportunistic hunter preys voraciously on many types of animals, including bivalve mollusks, polychaetes, jellyfish, and small crustaceans. Where introduced, it may be detrimental to local marine life. On the west coast of the US, for example, it has had a considerable impact on the shellfish industry.
arthropods SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Blue Swimming Crab Portunus pelagicus LENGTH
Up to
23/4 in
(7 cm)
HABITAT
Intertidal sandy or muddy sea beds to 180 ft (55 m) DISTRIBUTION Coastal waters of the Indian and Pacific oceans, eastern Mediterranean
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Orange Fiddler Crab Uca vocans LENGTH
About 1 in (2.5 cm) HABITAT
Near water on mud or sand DISTRIBUTION
Indian Ocean and western Pacific
Like its close relative the ghost crab (see above, right), the male orange fiddler crab also exhibits ritualistic displays to deter rivals. Males are easily recognized because one of their claws
Unlike most crabs, the blue swimming crab is an excellent swimmer and uses its fourth pair of flattened, paddlelike legs to propel itself through the water. Despite its common name, only the males are blue, and the females are a rather dingy greenish brown. Males also differ in having very long claws, more than twice as long as the width of their carapace. The claws are armed with sharp teeth that are used to snag small fish and other food items. When a blue swimming crab feels threatened, it usually buries itself in the sand. If this measure fails to deter the threat, the crab adopts its own threat stance, extending its claws sideways in an attempt to look as large as possible. The natural range of this crab has been extended to a small part of the eastern Mediterranean by the opening of the Suez Canal. It is a popular food in Australia. is greatly enlarged. In a mature adult this claw makes up more than half the crab’s body weight and is used both to attract potential mates and to ward off rival males. Observing the distinctive “courtship wave” of fiddler crabs is helpful in identifying different species. Orange fiddler crabs are active during the day. As well as digging a main burrow up to 12 in (30 cm) deep, they create a number of bolt holes into which they can retreat if danger threatens. At high tide, they seal themselves into their burrows with a small pocket of air. The presence of air is essential for their survival because fiddler crabs obtain oxygen from air, not water, despite having gills.
SUBPHYLUM CRUSTACEA
Ghost Crab Ocypode saratan LENGTH
About 11/2 in (3.5 cm) HABITAT
Sandy shores in deep burrows above the water line Coastal waters of western Indian Ocean, Red Sea
DISTRIBUTION
303
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2)45!,$)30,!9 %ACHSPECIESOFFIDDLERCRABWAVES ITSCLAWINASLIGHTLYDIFFERENTWAY )FTHISRITUALMOVEMENTDOESNOT DETERARIVALMALE THENTWOCRABS MAYªARM WRESTLE«EACHOTHER TORESOLVETHEIRDISPUTE4HE WEAKERINDIVIDUALUSUALLY RETREATSBEFOREANYSERIOUS DAMAGEISDONE LEFT- OR RIGHT-HANDED?
Both crabs in this picture are righthanded, but in some males it is the left claw that is enlarged (see below).
OCEAN LIFE
RESTORING THE BALANCE
On arriving at the shore, the crabs head to the ocean, where they replace water and body salts lost during the arduous journey down from the forest plateau.
306
animal life SUBPHYLUM INSECTA
SUBPHYLUM INSECTA
Shore Bristletail
Rock Springtail
Petrobius maritimus
Anurida maritima
DISTRIBUTION
LENGTH
LENGTH
2/ 5
Up to 1/8 in (3 mm)
in (1 cm)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Rocky shores in the splash zone
Upper intertidal zone of rocky shores
British Isles excluding Ireland
The shore bristletail, also known as the shore springtail, derives its common name from the three long filaments extending from the tip of its abdomen. Its long body is wellcamouflaged by drab-colored scales. It has long antennae and compound eyes that meet at the top of its head. The shore bristletail lives in rock crevices and feeds on detritus. It can move swiftly around the rocks using small spikes on its underside, called styles, to help it grip. When disturbed, it can leap small distances through the air using its abdomen to catapult it away from the rock.
DISTRIBUTION
Coasts of the British Isles
At low tide hundreds of rock springtails wander down the beach searching for food, returning to the shelter of their rock crevices an hour before the tide turns.Vast numbers
in (1 cm)
HABITAT
Sand dune systems
Marine Skater
Kelp Fly
Halobates sericeus
Coelopa frigida LENGTH
LENGTH
Females: 1/5 in (5 mm)
1/8 –2/5
HABITAT
HABITAT
Ocean surface
Temperate shores with rotting seaweed
Pacific Ocean between 40º and 5º north and south of the equator
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
SUBPHYLUM INSECTA
This is a member of the only truly marine genus of insects. The marine skater spends its entire life on the surface of tropical and subtropical oceans where winter temperatures rarely fall below 68ºF (20ºC). Little is known about these insects due to the difficulty in studying them. Females are larger than males and after mating they lay 10–20 cream-colored, oval eggs on a piece of flotsam, such as a piece of floating wood. The eggs hatch into nymphs that molt through five stages before becoming adults. Because this insect never dives below the surface, its diet is restricted to small organisms such as floating fish eggs, zooplankton, and dead jellyfish. It feeds by releasing enzymes onto the surface of its food and then drawing in the predigested material through its modified mouthparts.
DISTRIBUTION
shorelines
in (3–10 mm)
North Atlantic and north Pacific
LENGTH
Up to 3/4 in (2 cm) HABITAT
Intertidal sandy and muddy shores Coasts of the British Isles and northern Europe
DISTRIBUTION
in seawater they simply float up to the surface and fly off. Their larvae are equally waterproof. Strongly attracted to rotting seaweed by its smell, the female kelp flies seek out warm spots in which to lay their eggs. The larvae hatch and feed on the seaweed around them. After three molts they pupate; the adults emerge and complete the life cycle about 11 days after the eggs were laid. Kelp flies are an important food source for several coastal birds, including kelp gulls and sandpipers.
LENGTH
Important in the pollination of sanddune plants, the dune snail bee has a compact, brownish black body with a dense covering of golden red hairs that later fade to gray. Unlike the honey bee, which carries any pollen it collects in pouches on its legs, the dune snail bee carries its pollen in a brush of hairs under its abdomen.
Bledius spectabilis
The most widely distributed of the seaweed flies, the kelp fly is found almost everywhere there is rotting seaweed along a strand line. They have flattened, lustrous black bodies, tinged with gray, and bristly, brownish yellow legs. Of the two pairs of wings, only the front pair is functional, the hind pair being modified to small clubshaped halteres that act as stabilizers when in flight. Kelp flies can crawl through vast layers of slimy seaweed without getting stuck, and if immersed
Osmia aurulenta
Coasts of northeastern Atlantic, North Sea, Baltic, and Mediterranean
Intertidal Rove Beetle
Male bees of this species emerge between April and July, a little earlier in the year than the females, and seek out territories that contain a snail shell. They then leave scent marks (pheromones) on the stems of plants to attract passing females. Once a female has mated with her chosen partner, she will adjust the position of the shell so that the entrance is oriented in the most sheltered direction and lays her eggs inside it.
Dune Snail Bee 2/5
SUBPHYLUM INSECTA
Unusual in that it lives in the intertidal zone after which it is named, this small arthropod has an elongated, smooth black body. Short reddish brown wing cases, or elytra, protect the wings but leave most of the flexible abdomen exposed. A mobile abdomen allows the intertidal rove beetle to squeeze into narrow crevices and also to push its wings up under the elytra. Most rove beetles are active either by day (diurnal) or by night (nocturnal), but the life of the intertidal rove beetle is dictated by the tides. It builds a vertical, wine-bottle shaped burrow in the sand with a living chamber about 1/5 in (5 mm) diameter and retreats into it whenever the tide comes in. The burrow entrance is so narrow—about 1/10 in (2 mm) in diameter—that the air pressure within prevents any water from entering. The female lays her eggs in side chambers within the burrow and remains on guard, until her offspring have hatched and are mature enough to leave and construct their own burrows.
SUBPHYLUM INSECTA
DISTRIBUTION
SUBPHYLUM INSECTA
of them squeeze together in the fissures to avoid being immersed at high tide. It is here that they molt and lay their eggs safe from submersion and many of their predators. Rock springtails are blue-gray in color with segmented bodies that are wider at the posterior end. They have three pairs of appendages used for locomotion, which also allow them to swarm over the surface of calm rock pools without sinking—they cannot swim. Springtails are so named for their jumping organ, called the furcula, which acts like a spring, propelling the animal upward if threatened. Unlike other springtails, however, the rock springtail does not have this feature.
bryozoans ATTACHED TO SEAWEED
BRYOZOANS
Bryozoans, such as this hard species encrusting a seaweed, often live in areas with strong currents.
THESE COLONIAL ANIMALS live
DOMAIN Eucarya
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KINGDOM Animalia
attached to the sea bed and although SPECIES 4,000–5,000 numerous, they are often overlooked. The individuals making up the colony are usually less than 1/32 in (1 mm) long, but the colonies may span over 3 ft (1 m). Bryozoans are also called ectoprocts or sea mats, the latter name referring to their tendency to encrust the surfaces of stones and seaweeds. Other colonial forms of bryozoan include corallike growths, branched plantlike tufts, and fleshy lobes. Most species are marine, but a few live in fresh water. PHYLUM Bryozoa
ANATOMY
HABITATS
A bryozoan colony is made up of individuals called zooids, and may contain several or up to many millions. Each zooid is encased in a boxshaped body wall of calcium carbonate or a gelatinous or hornlike material, and a small hole links it to other zooids. To feed, the animal pushes a circular or horseshoe-shaped structure (a lophophore) out of an opening. This is crowned by tentacles covered in tiny, beating hairs that draw in planktonic food. In most species, fertilized eggs are stored in specialized zooids that form a brood chamber for developing larvae.
With their great variety of body form, bryozoans can be found in almost any habitat from the seashore to the deep ocean, and from Arctic waters to tropical coral reefs. Colonies are most often found firmly attached to BRYOZOANS UNDER ATTACK submerged rocks, seagrasses, seaweeds, Sea slugs often make a meal mangrove roots, and dead shells, but some of encrusting bryozoans, encrusting species even hitch a ride on the breaking into each zooid and shells of living crustaceans and mollusks. A few eating the insides. unusual species do not need a surface for support and can live in the sand; these bryozoan colonies can move slowly over or through the sand by coordinated rowing movements of a long projection found on specialized zooids. Bryozoan colonies originate from a single larva that settles on the seabed and becomes a zooid. More zooids are added to the colony by budding, a process in which a new zooid grows out from the side of the body wall. Most bryozoan larvae are short-lived and settle near the parent.
MAT OF ZOOIDS
This encrusting species of bryozoan has rectangular zooids joined in a single layer. The resulting mat spreads over seaweeds.
ORDER CTENOSTOMATA
ORDER CHEILOSTOMATA
Gelatinous Bryozoan Hornwrack Alcyonidium diaphanum
Flustra foliacea
SIZE (HEIGHT)
SIZE (HEIGHT)
Up to 12 in (30 cm)
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
DEPTH
DEPTH
From shore down
0–330 ft (0–100 m)
HABITAT
HABITAT
Rocks and shelly sand DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern
Atlantic
Stones, shells, rock Temperate and Arctic waters of northeastern Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
This species is often mistaken for a brown seaweed. The colony grows up from a narrow base as thin, flat, fanlike lobes. These usually form dense clumps and cover the sea bed like a crop of tiny brown lettuces. They litter the strandline on many shores in dried clumps and, by using a magnifying glass, an observer can easily see the individual, oblong colony members.
Pink Lace Bryozoan Iodictyum phoeniceum SIZE (WIDTH)
Up to 8 in (20 cm) DEPTH
50–130 ft (15–40 m) HABITAT
Rocky reefs DISTRIBUTION
Australia
Temperate and tropical waters around
Pink lace bryozoan colonies feel hard and brittle to the touch because the walls of the individual zooids are reinforced with calcareous material. The colony is shaped like curly-edged potato chips with a lacework of small holes. Its beautiful dark pink to purple color remains even after the colony is dead and dried. This species prefers to live in areas with some current, and its holes may help reduce the force of the water against it. Similar species are found on coral reefs throughout the Indo-Pacific region.
OCEAN LIFE
Colonies of this bryozoan have a firm, rubbery consistency and grow as irregular, lobed, or fingerlike growths that attach to their substrate with a small, encrusting base. This species may cause an allergic dermatitis when handled, and North Sea fishermen are often affected when their trawl nets have gone through areas of dense bryozoan undergrowth.
CLASS CHEILOSTOMATA
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animal life
ECHINODERMS group of invertebrates is derived from the Greek for “hedgehog skin.” The group KINGDOM Animalia includes starfish, sea urchins, brittlestars, feather stars, and sea PHYLUM Echinodermata cucumbers. Echinoderms have radiating body parts, so most CLASSES 6 appear star-shaped, disk-shaped, or spherical, and all have a SPECIES About 7,000 skeleton of calcium-carbonate plates under the skin. Inside is a unique system of water-filled canals, called the water-vascular system, that enables them to move, as well as to feed and breathe. Typically bottomdwellers, they live on reefs, shores, and the seabed. THE NAME OF THIS PURELY MARINE
DOMAIN Eucarya
RADIAL SYMMETRY
This tropical starfish has the five-rayed structure of echinoderms. Its arms are protected by hard plates, and its bright colors warn predators of its toxins.
ANATOMY The echinoderm body is based on a five-rayed symmetry similar to the petals of a flower. This is apparent in starfish, brittlestars, and urchin shells (tests). Sea urchins are like starfish, with their arms joined to form a ball. Sea cucumbers resemble elongated urchins—their five-rayed symmetry can be seen endon. The echinoderm skeleton is made of hard calcium-carbonate plates, which are fused to form a rigid shell (as in urchins) or remain separate (as in starfish). Usually, it also features spiny or knoblike extensions that project from the body. Sea cucumbers have minimal skeletons reduced to a series of small, isolated knobs. The water-vascular system consists of a network of canals and reservoirs, as well as tentacles that extend through pores in the skin to form hundreds of tiny tube feet. outlet of water-vascular system (madreporite)
anus
tube foot spine
gonad
calciumcarbonate plate
watervascular canal
intestine
mouthparts
MINI SUCKERS
SEA URCHIN BODY PLAN
Tube feet act like hydraulic suckers. They are operated by water squeezed in and out from a small reservoir similar to the bulb on the end of an eye dropper.
The body consists of a fluid-filled cavity inside the shell (test), which houses the organs. The mouth is in the center of the underside, and the anus is on top of the upper side.
OCEAN LIFE
ECHINODERM CLASSIFICATION The echinoderms were until recently split into five classes based on their shape, skeleton, and the position of their mouth, anus, and madreporite. The sixth class, comprising the newly discovered sea daisies, is regarded as part of the Asteroidea by some scientists. FEATHER STARS, SEA LILIES Class Crinoidea About 625 species
Also known as crinoids, these animals have a saucer-shaped body extending into five repeatedly branching, feathery arms used
as filter-feeding appendages. Mouth and anus face upward. Sea lilies attach to the sea bed by a jointed stalk, but feather stars break free when young to become swimming adults. STARFISH OR SEA STARS Class Asteroidea About 1,500 species
The body of these mostly seabed scavengers is star-shaped, with five or more stout arms merging into a central body disk. On the underside of the arms are rows of numerous tube feet and a groove, along which they pass food to the central mouth. The mouth is on the underside, and the anus and madreporite are on the upper surface. The skeleton is a layer of plates (ossicles) embedded in the body wall.
BRITTLESTARS, BASKET STARS Class Ophiuroidea
SEA CUCUMBERS Class Holothuroidea
About 2,000 species
About 1,250 species
These echinoderms have a disk-shaped body with five narrow, flexible arms. Basket stars’ arms are branched and finely divided. The skeleton is a series of overlapping plates. The mouth, on the underside, doubles as an anus.
These echinoderms have a sausage-shaped body with five double rows of tube feet, with those encircling the mouth modified into feeding tentacles. The skeleton comprises small, multi-shaped plates.
SEA URCHINS, SAND DOLLARS Class Echinoidea
SEA DAISIES Class Concentricycloidea
About 940 species
2 species
Body shape ranges from a disk (sand dollars) to a sphere (urchins) with five double rows of tube feet. The skeletal plates join to form a rigid shell (test) with movable spines.
The body is disk-shaped, edged with spines, and has no arms. The upper surface is scaly. The underside has a membrane (vellum) through which food is absorbed.
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REPRODUCTION Most echinoderms have separate males and females, which reproduce by releasing sperm and eggs, respectively, into the water. Individuals often gather to spawn at the same time, thereby increasing their chance of success. This synchronized spawning is initiated by factors such as daylight length and water temperature. Each echinoderm group has its own FLOATING AIDS type of larva with its own way of swimming, floating, Long, paired arms help sea-urchin larvae, such as and feeding. Some starfish, for example, keep their this one from a sea potato RELEASING SPERM AND EGGS fertilized eggs and developing larvae in a pouch under or heart urchin, to float in By rearing up to spawn, sea cucumbers ensure their mouth, and nourishment comes in the form the plankton. Brittlestars that their eggs have a chance of mixing with have similar larvae. sperm released by another individual. of yolk. In some brittlestars, the larvae are brooded in sacs inside the body, and the young are released after metamorphosis. In most species, however, the fertilized eggs drift in the plankton and develop into free-floating larvae. The larvae eventually transform Echinoderms range from peaceful grazers and filter feeders into their adult form and settle on the sea bed. to voracious predators. Carnivorous species of starfish extend their stomach over their prey and digest it externally. In contrast, most sea urchins are grazers, scraping rock surfaces using teeth that resemble the chuck of an electric drill. Combined with muscles and skeletal plates, they form a complex, powerful feeding apparatus called an Aristotle’s lantern. Sea cucumbers have an important role as sea-bed cleaners, vacuuming up organic debris and mud.
FEEDING
FILTER FEEDING BY TUBE FEET
Feather stars raise their arms to trap plankton using fingerlike tube feet. The food is coated in mucus and passed down the arms into the mouth.
DEFENSE
HUMAN IMPACT
If they can be broken open, sea urchins make a good meal for fish, sea birds, and sea otters. So, along with many other echinoderms, they protect themselves from predators with their long, sharp spines. These spines are mounted on ball-and-socket joints and can move in all directions, which turns them into fearsome weapons. If an echinoderm is attacked, spines may break off and embed themselves in the predator, creating a wound. Some spines are also venomous, such as those belonging to the crown-of-thorns starfish. Fire urchins and flower urchins also have enlarged and venomous, pincerlike pedicellariae (see below), which are strong enough to sting humans. The cumbersome-looking sea cucumbers have no spines or protective plates, but they are far from defenseless. If attacked, many eviscerate their gut (and sometimes other internal organs) as a decoy and regrow them later. Similarly, brittlestars can break free from attack by discarding an arm. Some tropical sea cucumbers eject sticky white threads, called Cuverian tubules, which are strong enough to entangle and restrain an attacking crab.
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Slow-moving urchins and starfish can become overgrown by planktonic larvae looking for a place to settle. They defend themselves by using spines modified into tiny pincers, called pedicellariae, to catch and crush the larvae.
REGENERATING LIMBS
This common starfish is regrowing its two lost arms. Sometimes, regrowth produces one or more extra limbs.
OCEAN LIFE
PEDICELLARIAE
)N%UROPEANWATERS THECOMMON STARFISHHASAVORACIOUSAPPETITE FOROYSTERSANDMUSSELS3O FISHERMENDREDGINGTHESHELLFISH BEDSUSEDTOCUTUPTHESTARFISH ANDTHROWTHEPIECESOVERBOARD 5NFORTUNATELYFORTHEFISHERMEN THISTACTICPROVEDINEFFECTIVE BECAUSESTARFISHCANNOTONLY REGENERATETHEIRLIMBS BUTIF ALOSTLIMBRETAINSPARTOFTHE CENTRALBODYDISK ITISABLETO COMPLETELYREGENERATETHEBODY
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animal life CLASS ASTEROIDEA
Seven-arm Starfish Luidia ciliaris DIAMETER
Up to 24 in
(60 cm) 0–1,300 ft (0–400 m)
DEPTH
Sediment, gravel, rock
HABITAT
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
itself in the sediment and delve after its prey. Using its long tube feet it can move very quickly over rocks and gravel to latch onto its victims. This starfish is a voracious predator that feeds mainly on other echinoderms, including burrowing sea urchins, sea cucumbers, and brittlestars. It breeds during the summer in southern Britain but much earlier, between November and January, in the Mediterranean. multidirectional, stiff white spines on arm
While the majority of starfish species have five arms, this large species has seven arms and very occasionally eight. Its body and arms have a velvety texture and are colored brick-red to orange-brown. Each arm is fringed with a conspicuous band of multidirectional, stiff white spines, which help the sevenarm starfish to bury
CLASS ASTEROIDEA
Icon Star Iconaster longimanus DIAMETER
Up to 5 in (12 cm) DEPTH
100–280 ft (30–85 m) HABITAT
Deep reefs and slopes Tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This strikingly patterned species has long, thin arms and a flat disk. The arms and disk are edged by rows of skeletal plates that protect the starfish
velvety red or orange skin
CLASS ASTEROIDEA
Cushion Star Culcita novaeguineae DIAMETER
Up to 12 in (30 cm) DEPTH
0–100 ft (0–30 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs Adaman Sea and tropical waters of western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
,)6% ).'5%343 CLASS ASTEROIDEA
4HESURFACEOFTHECUSHIONSTAR PROVIDESAHOMEFORATINY SHRIMP THESEA STARSHRIMP Periclimenes soror4HESHRIMP DOESNOHARMTOITSHOSTANDIS ALSOFOUNDONOTHERSTARFISH)T OFTENHIDESBENEATHTHESTARFISH ANDALSOMATCHESITSCOLORTOTHAT OFITSHOST
Goosefoot Starfish Anseropoda placenta DIAMETER
Up to 8 in (20 cm) DEPTH
and give it a rigid feel. These plates may be pale or dark and they form unique patterns on each individual, which enable researchers to recognize, track, and monitor individuals in the field. Data from such studies indicates that icon stars grow very slowly and suggests that the largest individuals may live as long as humans. Although icon stars usually live in deeper, dark waters, they are common in waters at depths of 15–65 ft (5–20 m) around Singapore, probably because the water there is turbid and light levels are low. Females produce large orange eggs that develop into tiny orange larvae; the eggs contain chemicals that deter fish predators. portion of its disk is marked with a dark red patch, and conspicuous red lines radiate outward from this patch, along its arms. Its underside is colored yellow. This starfish glides slowly over the sea bed searching for small crustaceans, mollusks, and other echinoderms to eat.
30–1,600 ft (10–500 m) HABITAT
Gravel, sand, mud Temperate and warm waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
The cushion star looks more like a spineless sea urchin than a starfish; it gets its name from its plump, rounded body. Its arms are so short that they merge with its body and only their tips can be seen. Juveniles are much flatter than adults and have a clear pentagonal star shape, with obvious arms. They hide under rocks to escape predators, whereas the tougher adults are relatively safe in the open. Cushion stars occur in a wide range of colors, from predominantly red to green and brown. The underside has five radiating grooves that represent the arms and are filled with tube feet. If the starfish is turned over, it can right itself by stretching out the tube feet on one side, anchoring them to the sea bed, and pulling. It feeds mainly on detritus and fixed invertebrates, including live coral. Two other similar species are found in the Indo-Pacific tropics but this one is the most common and widespread. thick, soft body
The goosefoot starfish gets its name from the appearance of the flattened, weblike disk that joins each of its five short arms together and produces an almost pentagonal shape. The central COMMENSAL SHRIMP
The sea-star shrimp seen here is on the underside of the cushion star but will venture out onto the top to feed.
CLASS ASTEROIDEA
Mosaic Sea Star Plectaster decanus DIAMETER
Up to 6 in (16 cm) DEPTH
30–600 ft (10–180 m) HABITAT
Rocky reefs DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of South Australia
The incredibly bright colors of this starfish may be a warning that it contains toxic chemicals. If carried with bare hands for any length of time, it causes numbness. A mosaic of raised yellow ridges covers its red upper surface and it has a soft texture. The mosaic sea star feeds mostly on sponges, and these may be the source of its toxins. When the females spawn, the fertilized eggs are retained and brooded on the underside of the body.
echinoderms CLASS ASTEROIDEA
Crown-of-thorns Starfish Acanthaster planci DIAMETER
Up to 20 in (50 cm) DEPTH
3–65 ft (1–20 m)
Occasional plagues of this large and destructive starfish have killed extensive areas of coral on the Great Barrier Reef of Australia and the western Pacific reefs. There has been much debate on whether such plagues are natural or are caused by overfishing of the few mollusks and fish that can eat this starfish, such as the giant triton, Charonia
tritonis (see p.287). With up to 20 arms and a formidable covering of long spines, this species has few predators. The spines are mildly venomous and may inflict a painful wound if the starfish is picked up with bare hands. Crown-of-thorns starfish feed on
311
corals by turning their stomach out through their mouth and digesting the coral’s living tissue. Pure white coral skeletons indicate that this starfish has been feeding recently in the area. In popular diving tourism areas, attempts are sometimes made to kill the starfish by injecting them with poison or removing them by hand, but with only limited success.
HABITAT
Coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of Indian and Pacific
oceans
CLASS OPHIUROIDEA
Common Brittlestar Ophiothrix fragilis DIAMETER
Up to 5 in
(12 cm) DEPTH
0–500 ft (0–150 m)
Rocks, rough and gravely ground
HABITAT
Temperate and warm waters of eastern Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
CLASS OPHIUROIDEA
arm coiled around black coral branch
Serpent Star DIAMETER
Up to 12 in
(30 cm) 50–600 ft (15–180 m)
DEPTH
Antipatharian black corals
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Tropical and temperate waters of Australia and southwestern Pacific
Serpent stars are a type of brittlestar with long, flexible arms. During the day they wind their arms tightly round the branches of the deep-water black corals in which they live. At night they uncoil their arms and move around, feeding on the living polyps of their host. A black coral bush one or two yards high may be host for up to forty or so serpent stars.
orange to brown and gray, and they often have alternate light and dark bands on the arms. The fragile arms of this species are covered in long, untidy spines, while its small disk, which is only 1 in (2 cm) across, has a covering of shorter spines. In the intertidal zone, common brittlestars are not usually found in groups, but occur as individuals hiding in crevices and beneath stones.
OCEAN LIFE
Astrobrachion adhaerens
This large brittlestar species gathers in dense groups that may cover several square miles of sea bed in areas where there are strong tidal currents. They have been recorded in densities of 2,000 individuals per square yard. Each brittlestar holds up one or two arms into the current to feed on plankton, while linking its remaining arms with surrounding individuals to form a strong mat and prevent itself being swept away. They vary greatly in color, ranging from red, yellow, and
312
animal life CLASS ECHINOIDEA
Sand Dollar Echinodiscus auritus DIAMETER
Up to 4 in (11 cm) DEPTH
0–165 ft (0–50 m) HABITAT
Clean sand Tropical and warm waters of Indian Ocean, Red Sea, western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
CLASS ECHINOIDEA
Long-spined Sea Urchin Diadema savignyi DIAMETER
Up to 9 in
(23 cm) DEPTH
0–230 ft (0–70 m)
HABITAT
Coral and rocky
reefs DISTRIBUTION
Pacific oceans
Tropical waters of Indian and western
Sand dollars are sea urchins that have become extremely flattened as an adaptation for burrowing through sand. A mat of very fine spines covers the shell, or test, and the pattern of the animal’s skeleton plates can often be seen through the skin. The mouth is on the underside. At the rear are two notches that open at the margins of the test, and water currents passing through these slits are thought to help to push the urchin down and prevent it being swept away. Many divers on coral reefs have learned to avoid these sea urchins. They bristle with long, sharp spines that can easily wound, even through a wetsuit. The spines are mildly venomous and so brittle that they may break off in the wound. If a diver or predator comes near it, this sea urchin waves its spines vigorously. Only a few tough fish, such as the titan triggerfish, can successfully attack and eat such prickly prey. This species often has striped spines, while the other common Indo-Pacific long-spined species, Diadema setosum, has black spines.
CLASS ECHINOIDEA
Flower Urchin Toxopneustes pileolus DIAMETER
Up to 6 in (15 cm) DEPTH
0–300 ft (0–90 m) HABITAT
Sand, rubble, rocky reef Tropical waters of Indian Ocean, central and western Pacific Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
This species is extremely venomous and has caused rare fatalities. It has short, inconspicuous spines through which emerge an array of flowerlike appendages called pedicellariae. These help to keep the urchin’s surface clean
but will sting animals that touch it. The pedicellariae also hold pieces of shell, rubble, and seaweed that shade the urchin from sunlight. Flower urchins may partially bury themselves, despite having few predators.
CLASS ECHINOIDEA
Edible Sea Urchin Echinus esculentus DIAMETER
Up to 6 in (16 cm) DEPTH
0–160 ft (0–50 m) HABITAT
Rocky areas DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern
Atlantic
This large, spherical urchin is covered with uniform short spines that give it the appearance of a fat hedgehog. It is generally a pinkish color, with pairs of darker, radiating lines where its numerous tube feet emerge. These urchins are important grazers and can have much the same effect underwater as rabbits do on land, leaving the rocks covered only in hard pink encrusting algae. As their name suggests, the roe of this species can be eaten.
CLASS ECHINOIDEA
Purple Sea Urchin Strongylocentrotus purpuratus DIAMETER
Up to 4 in (10 cm) DEPTH
0–130 ft (0–40 m) HABITAT
Rocky reefs Temperate coastline of North America from Alaska to Mexico
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
This small sea urchin has been responsible for the demise of large areas of giant kelp forest off the North American coastline. Like most sea urchins, it feeds by scraping away at seaweeds and fixed animals and its favorite food is the giant kelp Macrocystis pyrifera. Its numbers reach densities of up to several hundred animals per square yard, and it can chew through kelp holdfasts, setting the plants adrift. Populations are normally kept in check by sea otters and by large fish such as sheepheads. In the past, when sea otters were hunted, urchin numbers increased explosively in some areas.
313 CLASS ECHINOIDEA
Sea Potato Echninocardium cordatum LENGTH Up to 31/2 in (9 cm)
0–650 ft (0–200 m)
DEPTH
HABITAT
Sand, muddy
sand DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern
Atlantic
Most sea urchins live in rocky areas, but the sea potato or heart urchin burrows in the sand. Unlike regular urchins, it has a distinct front end and its spines are thin and flattened. Special spoon-shaped spines on the urchin’s underside help it to dig, while longer spines on its back allow water to funnel down into its burrow to be used for respiration. The dried shell, or test, of this urchin resembles a potato, hence the common name.
CLASS CRINOIDEA
Sea Lily Neocrinus decorus HEIGHT
Up to 24 in
(60 cm) 500–4,000 ft (150–1,200 m)
DEPTH
Deep-sea sediments
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of western Atlantic
Ocean
Sea lilies are stalked relatives of feather stars and usually remain fixed in the same place after developing from a settled planktonic larva. However,
CLASS CRINOIDEA
Tropical Feather Star Oxycomanthus bennetti DIAMETER
Up to 6 in (15 cm) DEPTH
35–165 ft (10–50 m) HABITAT
Coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of western Pacific
All that can usually be seen of the tropical feather star is its numerous feathery arms held up into the water to trap food. This species has about a hundred arms, compared to the ten that most temperate water feather stars have. The arms are attached to a small, disklike body and the mouth is on the upper side of the
while Neocrinus decorus and other, similar sea lilies cannot swim, like shallow-water feather stars, they have been filmed dragging themselves over the sea bed by their arms. To do this, they appear to break off the end of the stalk, then reattach to the substrate using flexible, fingerlike appendages on the stalk. In this way they can escape from predatory sea urchins. The stalk consists of a stack of diskshaped skeleton pieces called ossicles, and looks like a simple vertebrate spinal column. Sea lilies feed by spreading out their numerous, feathery arms against the current and trapping plankton. Food particles are passed down the arms and into the mouth.
DISCOVERY
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body, between the arms. The tropical feather star clings to corals using numerous articulated, finger-like appendages called cirri. It prefers elevated positions where it is exposed to food-bearing currents, and is active by both day and night. Like all feather stars, this species starts its early life by becoming attached to the seabed by a stalk—at this stage, it closely resembles a small sea lily. As it matures, the feather star breaks away and becomes free-living, leaving the stalk behind.
CLASS CRINOIDEA
Passion Flower Feather Star Ptilometra australis DIAMETER
Up to 5 in
(12 cm) DEPTH
To at least 200 ft
HABITAT
Rocky reefs,
rubble Endemic to temperate waters of southern Australia
DISTRIBUTION
This stout feather star has 18–20 arms with long, stiff side branches called pinnules; the arms are different lengths, giving it a flowerlike appearance
OCEAN LIFE
(60 m)
when viewed from above. They are called passion flowers by fishermen because they are brought up in large numbers by commercial trawlers, clinging tightly to their nets. These feather stars are found in reefs and also in very shallow, sheltered bays and estuaries. Like most feather stars, the passion feather star is a filter feeder that grips onto the tops of rocks, sponges, and sea fans, where it spreads its arms wide to trap plankton and suspended detritus. It remains expanded both day and night but, like other feather stars, it can curl up its arms if disturbed or while resting. Its usual color is a burgundy red.
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CLASS HOLOTHUROIDEA
Prickly Redfish Thelenota ananas LENGTH
Up to 28 in
(70 cm) DEPTH
16–100 ft (5–30 m)
Sandy areas of coral reefs
HABITAT
Tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This massive sea cucumber looks like an animated rug as it crawls slowly over the sea bed. The large, star-shaped papillae, called caruncles, that cover its
CLASS HOLOTHUROIDEA
Sea Cucumber Bohadschia graffei LENGTH
Up to 12 in (30 cm)
body make it an unattractive proposition to potential predators. However, its appearance does not deter humans, and prickly redfish fetches high prices in parts of eastern Asia, where it is considered a delicacy. Large specimens reach up to 11 lb (5 kg) in weight and are traditionally collected by reef walking at low tide or by
CLASS HOLOTHUROIDEA
Edible Sea Cucumber
Sea Apple Pseudocolochirus tricolor LENGTH
Up to 4 in (10 cm) LENGTH
15–165 ft (5–50 m)
0–100 ft (0–30 m)
DEPTH
HABITAT
15–100 ft (5–30 m)
Coral reefs
HABITAT
Tropical waters of Indian Ocean, Red Sea, western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Sand, rock, coral reefs DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of Indian and Pacific
oceans
As its name suggests, this is an edible species of sea cucumber, although it is not considered as good eating as others, such as the prickly redfish (above). It has a soft body, peppered with tiny warts, and is colored black on its back and pinkish red to beige underneath. Like many other large sea cucumbers, it is sometimes host to small pearlfish (family Carapidae) that live inside its body cavity.
OCEAN LIFE
DEPTH
Up to 14 in (35 cm)
HABITAT
its main food, calcareous Halimeda seaweeds. When spawning, prickly redfish gather together and rear up, then release eggs or sperm into the water from small pores near the head end of the body.
CLASS HOLOTHUROIDEA
Holothuria edulis
DEPTH
The juveniles of this sea cucumber look completely different from the adult (shown here). They are white with black lines and protruding yellow papillae, closely resembling sea slugs from the genus Phyllidia. These slugs are distasteful to fish, so this mimicry protects the young sea cucumbers. Bohadschia graeffei feeds by scooping sand and mud into its mouth using large black tentacles, which are modified tube feet. Organic material in the sediment is digested, while the remainder passes through the gut and is deposited outside, looking like a string of sausages. In areas where sea cucumbers are common, much of the surface sediment is vacuumed up and cleaned several times a year in this way.
breath-hold diving. Other predators include various fish and crustaceans. The flat underside of the prickly redfish is covered with orange tube feet, which it uses to crawl over the sea bed in search of
Rocks and reefs DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of Indo-Pacific region
The sea apple is one of the most colorful of all sea cucumbers and is widely collected for use in marine aquariums. It has a red and purple body and yellow tentacles. The species in the genus Pseudocolochirus are often hard to distinguish and for this reason the distribution map may include
CLASS HOLOTHUROIDEA
Deep-sea Cucumber Laetmogone violacea LENGTH
Not recorded
To at least 8,000 ft (2,500 m)
DEPTH
Soft sediments
HABITAT
Deep, cold waters of Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific oceans
DISTRIBUTION
In the deep ocean, sea cucumbers are one of the dominant sea-floor groups all over the world. Laetmogone violacea is one of a large number of species that crawl over the soft, muddy ocean bottom eating organic detritus. Its peglike “legs” may help to keep it from sinking too far into the mud. Ingested mud that the cucumber is
several species. The sea apple uses its tube feet to attach itself to rocks then extends its branched tentacles into the water to trap organic particles. From time to time, each tentacle is pushed into the mouth and the food it has trapped is wiped off. unable to digest leaves its body as fecal casts, which may then be eaten again by other sea cucumbers. Like many deep-sea animals, this sea cucumber is almost colorless but glows all over with bioluminescent light; exactly how the animal uses this light is not yet known. Some deep-sea starfish are known to light up when approached by a predator, which may scare it away. It may be that the deep-sea cucumber uses its bioluminescence in the same way.
small, bottom-living phyla
315
SMALL, BOTTOMLIVING PHYLA MANY DISPARATE INVERTEBRATES play important parts in marine ecosystems but are seldom seen, because they are small or their habitats are difficult to study. Like KINGDOM Animalia all animals, they are grouped into phyla, each phylum representing a body plan PHYLA 14 as distinct as invertebrates are from vertebrates. Most of these small, bottom-living SPECIES Many phyla live in seabed sediment and are loosely called “worms” due to their shape and burrowing lifestyle. However, the superabundant nematodes or roundworms (20,000 species) live in a wide range of environments, including the seabed. A selection of 14 bottom-living phyla are represented below. DOMAIN Eucarya
SANDGRAIN ANIMALS A community of tiny animals, referred to collectively as meiofauna, lives in the surface water film between the sand grains on beaches and in shallow water. They range in size from 1/100 in to 1/2 in (0.05 mm to 1 mm) and so can only be seen well with a microscope. Many have intricate and beautiful shapes. Almost every marine invertebrate phylum has representative species that live in this habitat, and several phyla, such as tardigrades (water bears) and gastrotrichs, occur virtually nowhere else. A diverse meiofauna is a good indication of a healthy environment, since these minuscule organisms are the basis for many marine food chains.
SAND COMMUNITY
Many invertebrates exist in the watery spaces between grains of coastal sand. The wormlike gastrotrich (phylum Gastrotricha) shown in this photomicrograph is typical of species found in this habitat.
MUDSWALLOWERS FEEDING APPARATUS
Female spoonworms (phylum Echiura) sweep up organic material and sediment with a scooplike proboscis, seen here extending from a burrow.
The consistency and structure of seashore and seabed sediments depends largely on the many wormlike phyla that live there. Millions of these burrowing animals continually mix and rework the sediment, a process called bioturbation. Lugworms (see p.275) are famous for their ability to eat sand, depositing the inedible material on the sand surface in the form of coiled heaps, or casts, but many of the less well-known groups, including peanut worms, acorn worms, and kinorhynchs, are just as important. Organic material washed onshore with each tide or carried by currents is quickly incorporated into the sediment as the animals move around, or is processed as the surface mud is eaten.
NEW PHYLA Scientists have so far described only a fraction of the species that live in oceans. New species are being discovered all the time, mostly in groups such as sponges and soft corals that traditionally have been neglected. Occasionally a species is found that is fundamentally different from all other known organisms and so it is classified as a new phylum. Most of these exciting discoveries are from inaccessible areas such as deep-sea mud, and the animals are usually small. But when the abundant life around deep-sea hydrothermal vents (see p.188–89) was sampled in the 1970s, gigantic tube worms like no others were found. DEEP-SEA WORM
HORSESHOE WORMS
These sedentary worms (phylum Phoronida) live in small tubes buried in sand or mud or (as here) attached to seabed rocks. To feed, the worms extend a horseshoeshaped net of tentacles.
OCEAN LIFE
The relatively recent discovery of giant tube worms living around hydrothermal vents led scientists to form a new phylum called Vestimentifera. They obtain food from symbiotic bacteria.
316 PHYLUM ENTEROPNEUSTA
Acorn Worm
Peanut Worm
Glossobalanus sarniensis
Golfingia vulgaris
SIZE
Not recorded Shallow water
DEPTH
HABITAT
PHYLUM PHORONIDA
Horseshoe Worm Phoronis hippocrepia Up to 4 in (10 cm)
LENGTH
0–165 ft (0–50 m)
DEPTH
HABITAT
Rocks and empty shells
Shallow coastal waters of Atlantic Ocean, northeastern and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Horseshoe worms are easily overlooked but they sometimes cover large areas of rock with their narrow, membranous tubes. The animal lives inside its tube,
PHYLUM NEMATODA
Roundworm Dolicholaimus marioni Up to 1/2 in (5 mm )
LENGTH
Intertidal
DEPTH
HABITAT
Among algae in rock pools
DISTRIBUTION
Shores of the northeastern
Atlantic
The peanut worm is shaped like a half-inflated sausage balloon. Its body is stout and has a long, thin region at the front called the introvert, which can be stretched right out or withdrawn completely inside the body. The animal has a crown of short tentacles around the mouth at the end of the introvert. It lives buried in sediment, which it eats as it burrows and digests any organic matter.
Up to 6 in (15 cm)
DEPTH
3 –330 ft (1–100 m)
OCEAN LIFE
HABITAT
Coastal temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
Female spoonworms have a proboscis that stretches out like an elastic band and can reach at least 3 ft (1 m) away in search of food. The worm’s green, pear-shaped trunk remains hidden between rocks, safe from predators. In this species, the tip of the proboscis
is forked, and usually this is all that can be seen of the worm. The proboscis collects food particles with the help of sticky mucus, and the food is moved along the proboscis and into the mouth by the whipping movements of hairlike cilia. Male spoonworms are tiny and parasitic on the females, their only function being to fertilize the female’s eggs.
plump body
extended introvert
Pterobranch Worm Rhabdopleura compacta Up to 1/2 in (5 mm)
LENGTH DEPTH
Not recorded
HABITAT
Attached to sessile animals
DISTRIBUTION
Cold waters of northern hemisphere
Like the acorn worms to which they are related (above, left), pterobranch worms live in a thin tube and their bodies are divided into a proboscis, collar, and trunk. They also have a pair of arms covered in tentacles arising from the collar region. The tubes of many individuals are connected together with strands of soft tissue that join the trunks of the animals, enabling them to form a colony.
PHYLUM PRIAPULIDA
Priapula Worm Priapulus caudatus Up to 4 in (10 cm) Not recorded Buried in sediment
Arctic Ocean
Muddy rocks
DISTRIBUTION
Northeastern Atlantic and eastern Mediterranean; possibly Indo-Pacific, Southern Ocean
PHYLUM PTEROBRANCHIA
DISTRIBUTION
Bonellia viridis
Muddy sand and gravel
The soft, slimy body of this wormlike animal is divided into three regions. At the front end is a pointed proboscis, separated from the long, thin trunk by a tubelike collar. It lives in a U-shaped burrow and feeds by trapping small organisms in sticky mucus and eating sediment. The sexes are separate, and reproduction can be either asexual, by fragmentation or budding, or sexual. Some biologists group acorn worms with pterobranch worms (see below) in one phylum, the Hemichordata. Unusually for invertebrates, they have some vertebrate characteristics, which include a nerve cord that runs along the back.
HABITAT
Spoonworm
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
DEPTH
PHYLUM ECHIURA
0–6,560 ft (0–2,000 m)
DEPTH
Coastal temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic
LENGTH
LENGTH
Soft sediments
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
LENGTH
DISTRIBUTION
which encrusts rock surfaces or can bore into shells or limestone rock so that only the top part of the tube shows. The end of the wormlike body is thickened and anchors the animal in its tube. The feeding head with its horseshoe of delicate ciliated tentacles is extended to catch tiny planktonic animals while the body remains hidden in the tube. The feeding head is called a lophophore and is found in all members of the phylum. Horseshoe worms brood their egg masses within the lophophore, and larvae are continually released to drift and develop in the water. It is hard to see which end is which on a roundworm, as both ends of its thin body are pointed. The body is round in cross-section and has longitudinal muscles but no circular ones. This results in a characteristic way of moving in which the body is thrashed in a single plane forming C- or S-shapes in the process. This is a marine species, but roundworms also occur in vast numbers in the soil and fresh water.
PHYLUM SIPUNCULA
Cold waters of north Atlantic and
The stout, cylindrical body of this animal is divided into a short barrelshaped proboscis at the head end, a longer trunk region, and a tail that consists of small bladders attached to a hollow stalk. The proboscis can be withdrawn into the trunk. The mouth on the end of the proboscis is edged with spines, which help the animal to seize other small marine worms for food.
small, bottom-living phyla PHYLUM POGONOPHORA
PHYLUM VESTIMENTIFERA
Pogonophoran Worm
Giant Tube Worm
Siboglinum ekmani
Riftia pachyptila
Up to 4 in (10 cm)
LENGTH
At least 330 ft (100 m)
DEPTH
HABITAT
Mud
DISTRIBUTION
PHYLUM BRACHIOPODA
Lamp Shell Terebratulina septentrionalis DEPTH
Up to 11/4 in (3 cm) 0–4,000 ft (0–1,200 m)
HABITAT
Rocks and stones
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic
DEPTH
6,560–13,120 ft (2,000–4,000 m)
HABITAT
Temperate waters of north Atlantic
Pogonophoran worms live inside tightly fitting tubes made of chitin, a substance that is also found in insect skin. The animal has an extremely long, thin body, like a piece of string, divided into different regions. The head end has a single tentacle, which can coil up when the animal contracts back into its tube. Behind the head end is a bridle, a raised ridge of tissue that runs obliquely around the body. The main length of the body is covered in small projections (papillae) and appears red under a microscope due to its blood, which contains hemoglobin. There is no gut and the animal feeds by absorbing dissolved organic matter from the water through the skin. The very end of the body has a segmented region with hairlike spines called setae that may help the animal to grip the sides of its tube.
LENGTH
Up to 61/2 ft (2 m)
HEIGHT
Temperate and cold waters of north
Hydrothermal vents
DISTRIBUTION
Pacific Ocean
When it was first discovered in the 1970s, living in great clusters in the deep sea around hydrothermal vents, the giant tube worm caused a sensation. It has many structural similarities to pogonophoran worms (see left), but is huge. Like them, it lives in a permanent tube and has no mouth or gut. Most of the worm’s body remains hidden but a brilliant red plume of gills sticks up out of the tube and absorbs chemicals and oxygen from the water. Living within the worm’s tissues are bacteria that can make up over half the weight of the body.
It would be easy to mistake a lamp shell for a small bivalve mollusk, as both have a hinged shell in two parts and live attached to the sea floor. Lamp shells, however, have a very thin, light shell and the two parts are different sizes, with the smaller one fitting into the larger. The shell valves cover the dorsal and ventral surfaces of the animal whereas in bivalve mollusks they are on the left and right side of
317
,)6).'7)4(/5435.,)'(4 'IANTTUBEWORMSOBTAINALLTHEIR ENERGYFROMCHEMICALSINTHEHOT WATERTHATPOURSOUTOFHYDROTHERMAL VENTS#HEMOSYNTHETICBACTERIAIN THEIRTISSUESOXIDIZESULFURTO PROVIDEENERGYANDFIXCARBONFROM VENTCHEMICALS4HEWORMSTHUS GAINTHEIRFOODWITHNODIRECTOR INDIRECTRELIANCEONSUNLIGHT VENT TUBE WORMS
Giant tube worms have their tubes attached deep within crevices to help keep them upright.
gill plume is red from hemoglobin in blood rigid tube
the body. Lamp shells attach their pear-shaped shell to hard surfaces by means of a fleshy stalk that emerges from a hole in the ventral shell valve. With the shell valves gaping open, the animal draws in a current of water that brings plankton with it. Taking up most of the space inside the shell is a feeding structure called the lophophore, which consists of two lateral lobes and a central coiled lobe
covered in long ciliated tentacles. The beating of the cilia creates the water current. Lamp shells are found worldwide, but they are especially abundant in colder waters. In the northeastern Atlantic, Terebratulina septentrionalis is mostly found in deep water, while along the east coast of North America, it commonly occurs in shallow water. This species is very similar to Terebratulina retusa.
OCEAN LIFE
318
animal life PHYLUM KINORHYNCHA claw
Mud Dragon Echinoderes aquilonius Less than 1 mm
LENGTH DEPTH
Shallow water
HABITAT
Muddy sediments
DISTRIBUTION
Northwestern Atlantic
Mud dragons look rather like miniature insect pupae. The body appears segmented on the outside but this is only superficial. It is covered with a thick, articulated cuticle and there are sharp spines on each body section. The tail end has a bunch of longer spines, and the head region has several rings of spines. The mouth is situated on the end of a cone-shaped structure and the animal can withdraw the entire head region into the rest of the body for protection rather as a tortoise does, but it can also close the resulting hole with special plates, which are called placids. The head spines are used to help the animal push its way through the sediment, feeding on organic debris, bacteria, protists, and diatoms. There are about 100–150 species of mud dragons, all of which are marine. The sexes are separate but look similar. The eggs develop into free-living larvae that molt several times before attaining the adult form.
gut
stubby leg
PHYLUM TARDIGRADA
Water Bear Echiniscoides sigismundi Less than 1 mm
LENGTH DEPTH
Not recorded
HABITAT
Marine sands
DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide
This species of water bear lives in the spaces between sand grains in marine sediments, as do most of the other 25 or so marine species. The rest of the 400 or so other species live in fresh water, especially in the thin layer of water around damp-loving plants such as mosses. Water bears have a short, plump body without a well-defined head but with eyespots and sensory appendages at one end. There are four
pairs of short stubby legs each ending in a bunch of tiny claws on which the animal lumbers slowly along. The relatively thick skin protects against abrasion from sand grains. The sexes are separate, but there are few males and the eggs can probably develop without being fertilized. The nearest relatives of these tiny animals are thought to be the land velvet worms of the phylum Onchophora.
PHYLUM CYCLIOPHORA
Gastrotrich
Symbion pandora
Turbanella species
0.3 mm
LENGTH DEPTH
Not recorded
HABITAT
Mouthparts of the Norway Lobster
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
PHYLUM GASTROTRICHA
Cycliophoran
North Sea
Symbion pandora is the only known representative of the phylum Cycliophora. This minute animal was first described in 1995 by two Danish biologists. It was found clinging to the mouthparts of a Norway lobster (Nephrops norvegicus) that was dredged up from the North Sea, and the biologists must have looked very closely to have seen it at all. The female has a rounded body and is attached to the substratum by a short stalk and an adhesive disk. Attached to her are tiny dwarf males that never release their grip. It feeds by means of a mouth funnel surrounded by cilia and excretes via an anus next to the mouth. The reproductive cycle is complex and involves both sexually and asexually produced freeswimming larvae. The structure and habits of this species are so unlike any other known organism that it was classified in a new phylum of its own. Molecular studies indicate that it may be related to rotifers (see p.319) and wormlike creatures called acanthocephalans. The asexual reproduction is similar to that seen in some bryozoans.
Less than 1 mm
LENGTH DEPTH
Not recorded
HABITAT
Well-oxygenated sediments
DISTRIBUTION
Not recorded
Gastrotrichs are found in both fresh water and the sea, but Turbanella is a marine genus that lives in the spaces between sand grains in sea-floor sediments. It looks similar to a ciliated protist, but is a true multicellular animal with a mouth, gut, kidney cells, and other structures. It has several adhesive tubes, structures that secrete a sticky substance and help the animal attach to the substratum. By attaching and detaching the adhesive tubes at the front and rear of its body, it can loop around rather like a leech. Alternatively, it can glide using its cilia, searching for bacteria and protists to eat.
gut
cilia
planktonic phyla
319
PLANKTONIC PHYLA OF THE MANY MAJOR GROUPS (phyla) of invertebrate animals, a few are entirely composed of planktonic animals. Like all animals, they are classified into different phyla based on their anatomy, which can be complex. All are ecologically important because the plankton community underpins all the ocean food chains. Three minor phyla (Ctenophora, Chaetognatha and Rotifera) are represented here.
DOMAIN Eucarya KINGDOM Animalia PHYLA Ctenophora Chaetognatha Rotifera SPECIES 2,170
PREDATORS Carnivorous zooplankton have many methods of catching prey. Comb jellies are voracious predators—some trap their prey with a sticky secretion released from special cells (colloblasts) lining their tentacles. Others draw in prey using negative pressure created by rapidly opening their mouths. Species of Haeckelia even recycle the stinging cells from their cnidarian prey. Arrow-worms have vibration sensors to detect prey, which is caught and held by moveable hooks. The prey is then paralyzed by neurotoxins released from pores adjacent to the mouth.
HOOKING PREY
This arrow-worm has brown-colored hooks on either side of its circular mouth for holding prey.
GRAZERS
ROTIFER FEEDING METHOD
The rotifer’s ciliated crown, used in locomotion and filter feeding, is visible on the left.
Some of the zooplankton are herbivorous, grazing on phytoplankton or filter feeding. Some planktonic rotifers feed on organic particles suspended in the water. The cilia on the crown that surrounds the oral cavity waft water into a food groove leading to the mouth. Here, food particles are sifted and returned to the pharynx where jawlike structures, called trophi, grind the food before it passes into the stomach. Trophi are unique to rotifers. creeping comb jelly
PHYLUM CTENOPHORA
Creeping Comb Jelly Coeloplana astericola DIAMETER 1/2
in (1 cm)
DEPTH
Not recorded HABITAT
On the orange sea star DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of western Pacific
While most comb jellies live in the plankton, creeping comb jellies have taken up a bottom-living existence. Instead of the more usual rounded shape, they are flattened and look like
GLEAMING CILIA
Comb jellies, or sea gooseberries, swim by beating eight vertical rows of cilia combs, which shimmer with iridescent colors.
PHYLUM CTENOPHORA
a tiny squashed ball. The mouth is in the center of the underside with the statocyst, a balancing organ found in all comb jellies, opposite it on the upper side. Comb rows are absent as they have no need to swim, and they move by muscular undulations of the body rather like a small flatworm. This species lives on the orange sea star (Echinaster luzonicus), lying still and PHYLUM CTENOPHORA
Predatory Comb Jelly Mnemiopsis leidyi LENGTH
Up to 3 in (7 cm) DEPTH
0–100 ft (0–30 m) Open water Temperate and subtropical waters of western Atlantic, Mediterranean, and Black Sea
DISTRIBUTION
This comb jelly is a slightly flattened pear shape and has two rounded lobes on each side of the mouth that help it to surround and enclose larger prey. As well as two main feeding tentacles,
Cestum veneris LENGTH
Up to 61/2 ft (2 m) DEPTH
Near surface HABITAT
Open water Tropical and subtropical waters of north Atlantic, Mediterranean, and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
almost invisible during the day, its color and mottled pattern matching its echinoderm host. At night, it extends its two long feeding tentacles to ensnare planktonic prey. there are smaller secondary tentacles in grooves surrounding the mouth. The long tentacles are armed with lasso cells that secrete a sticky material to ensnare prey. The predatory comb jelly, which is native to the western Atlantic, was accidentally introduced to the Black Sea in the 1980s by the release of ship ballast water, and it has since spread to adjacent bodies of water, including parts of the eastern Mediterranean. In the Black Sea, it multiplied rapidly because of the ideal water conditions and the absence of its natural predators. This has had very serious effects on commercial fish catches because the predatory comb jelly is a planktonic predator and consumes fish larvae and fry.
The unusual name of this animal comes from the ribbon shape of its transparent, pale violet body. Eight rows of comb cilia are modified and run in two lines along one edge of the ribbon. The two main tentacles are short, and numerous other short tentacles occur along the lower edge of the body. As an escape response, Venus’s girdle can swim rapidly by undulating its body. However, more usually it moves slowly by beating its comb cilia.
OCEAN LIFE
HABITAT
Venus’s Girdle
320
animal life
TUNICATES AND LANCELETS TUNICATES HAVE A LONG,
baglike body often attached to the sea floor; lancelets resemble small, stiff worms and live buried in sediment. Despite their simple appearance, these animals are included not with the world’s other invertebrates but in the same group as backboned animals such as fish and mammals. This is because, uniquely among invertebrates, tunicates and lancelets possess an internal skeletal rod, or notochord. The best-known tunicates are sea squirts, some of which form colonies, whereas lancelets are solitary.
DOMAIN Eucarya KINGDOM Animalia PHYLUM Chordata SUBPHYLA Urochordata Cephalochordata CLASSES 4 or 5 SPECIES About 2,000
LIFESTYLE
ANATOMY When tunicate larvae become adults, they lose the supporting notochord, but lancelets keep it during the adult stage. Tunicates are covered by a tough protective bag made out of cellulose called a tunic, which sticks to the sea floor by means of rootlike projections. Inside is a big sievelike structure, the pharynx, which connects the mouth and gut. This has a sticky mucus coating to trap plankton from the seawater passing through it. Lancelets also filter water through a pharynx, expelling it through an opening near the anus. A ring of stiff hairs (cirri) surrounding their mouth prevents sand getting in. pharynx
LANCELET ADULT
Sea squirts live attached to hard surfaces such as rocks, reefs, and shipwrecks. They spend their time filtering seawater, drawing in food-rich water through one siphon (inhalent) and releasing waste water through another (exhalent). Most sea squirts occur in shallow coastal waters where there is plenty of plankton, but there are also a few deep-water species. In sheltered sea lochs, they can cover hundreds of square yards of sea bed. Some tunicates, including salps and pyrosomes, drift along on ocean currents with the plankton, often forming giant swarms. Lancelets are strong swimmers due to their flexible, muscular bodies, but they usually just burrow in sediment with only their head sticking out.
BOTTOM-LIVING SQUIRTS
Sea squirts sometimes grow together in clumps with cnidarians, such as sea sponges, and they can be very colorful.
dorsal nerve cord notochord
A lancelet’s muscular body is flattened from side to side and is supported by a stiff notochord. swimming muscles
cirri surrounding mouth
anus
TUNICATE LARVA
The tadpole-shaped tunicate larva‘s nerve cord and notochord are reabsorbed when it changes into the adult form.
nerve cord
siphon
notochord
pharynx attachment sucker heart
inhalent siphon exhalent siphon tunic pharynx water current digestive gland ovary heart gut
SWIMMING SQUIRT
TUNICATE ADULT
Floating salps swim by jet propulsion, taking in water at one end and squirting it out of the other.
Most of the space inside a tunicate is taken up by the huge pharynx, through which there is a nonstop current of water.
SUBPHYLUM UROCHORDATA
Common Sea Squirt Ciona intestinalis HEIGHT
Up to 6 in
(15 cm) 0–1,600 ft (0–500 m)
DEPTH
Any hard substrate
HABITAT
Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, Arctic oceans; possibly Southern Ocean
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
The common sea squirt has no supporting structures in its adult form, so when it is seen out of water, it resembles a blob of jelly that may squirt out a jet of water when prodded. It is a typical solitary tunicate, whose internal structures are visible through its pale, greenish yellow, gelatinous outer covering, called a test or tunic, which is smooth and translucent. It has two yellow-edged
siphons and uses the larger of these, the inhalent siphon, to draw in water; the smaller, exhalent siphon is used to expel water, and its opening has six lobes, while that of the exhalent siphon has eight. The common
sea squirt lives up to its name and is found attached to a wide variety of rocks, reefs, seaweeds, and, in particular, man-made structures. The legs of oil platforms and jetties, for example, are often festooned with this sea squirt.
#,%!.).'50 )NSHELTEREDSEALOCHSAND HARBORS THECOMMONSEASQUIRT OFTENCOVERSLARGEAREASOFROCK ORWALL)NSPITEOFITSSMALLSIZE ITISABLETOFILTERSEVERALQUARTSOF WATERPERHOUR FILTERINGOUT PLANKTONANDOTHERORGANIC PARTICLESANDLEAVINGTHEWATER MUCHCLEARERTHANITMIGHT OTHERWISEBE
tunicates and lancelets SUBPHYLUM UROCHORDATA
SUBPHYLUM UROCHORDATA
Colonial Sea Squirt
Star Sea Squirt
Didemnum molle
Botryllus schlosseri HEIGHT
WIDTH (CLUSTER)
Up to 11/4 in (3 cm)
Up to 6 in (15 cm)
DEPTH
DEPTH
Shallow water
Shore and shallows
HABITAT
HABITAT
Coral reefs and rocks Widespread in tropical reef waters of Indian and western Pacific Oceans DISTRIBUTION
Rock, stones, seaweeds Coastal Arctic and temperate waters of north Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
Individual star sea squirts are only about 3/32 in (2 mm) long and cannot live on their own. Instead, they arrange themselves in star-shaped clusters, or colonies, embedded in a shared gelatinous casing, called a tunic or test. At the center of each star is a shared outgoing (exhalent) opening through which used water is voided. The colonies vary greatly in color and may be green, violet, brown, or yellow, with the individuals having a contrasting color to the test.
Salp Pegea confoederata LENGTH
Up to 6 in (15 cm) DEPTH
Near surface HABITAT
Open water DISTRIBUTION
Warm waters worldwide
Salps are tunicates that resemble floating sea squirts. They swim by jet propulsion, taking in water through a siphon at one end of their bodies and expelling it at the other. Their transparent casing is loose and flabby and is encircled by four main muscles that form two distinct cross-bands. Individual salps are joined together in chains up to 12 in (30 cm) long, produced by the asexual reproduction (budding) of a young individual. The chains break up and disperse as they mature. Salps also reproduce sexually. Eggs are kept inside the body on the wall of the exhalent siphon, through which the developed larvae are expelled after being fertilized by sperm drawn in through the inhalent siphon.
SUBPHYLUM UROCHORDATA
Giant Pyrosome LENGTH
Up to 33 ft (10 m) long DEPTH
Near surface HABITAT
Open water Warm waters between about 40˚ north and 40˚ south DISTRIBUTION
Pyura spinifera HEIGHT
Up to 12 in (30 cm) DEPTH
15–200 ft (5–60 m) HABITAT
Rocky reefs DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of Australia
The individuals that make up this giant, floating, colonial tunicate are only about 1 in (2 cm) long, but the colony, which resembles a gigantic hollow tube, can be large enough for a person to fit inside. Each individual lies embedded in the wall of the tube, with one end drawing in nutrientladen water from outside and the other end expelling water and waste inside. The expelled water is used to propel the colony as a whole. A wave of bioluminescent light travels along the community if it is touched.
SUBPHYLUM CEPHALOCHORDATA
Lancelet
Oikopleura labradoriensis
Branchiostoma lanceolatum
LENGTH
LENGTH
About 1/4 in (5 mm)
Up to 21/2 in (6 cm)
DEPTH
DEPTH
Near surface
Shore and shallows
HABITAT
HABITAT
Open water
Coarse sand
DISTRIBUTION
Cold waters of north Atlantic, north Pacific, and Arctic
DISTRIBUTION
Appendicularians are shaped like tiny tadpoles and live inside flimsy mucus dwellings that they build to trap plankton. Water enters the dwelling via two inlets covered by protective grids, passes through fine nets that trap any plankton in mucus, and passes out through an aperture. The animal eats the plankton-loaded mucus and beats its tail to create water currents.
Looking like a thin, semitransparent, elongate leaf, the lancelet is difficult to spot in the coarse sediments in which it lives. It usually lies half-buried in the sand with its head end sticking out. Muscle blocks that run along both sides of its body show through the skin as a pattern of V-shaped stripes. At the head end, a delicate hood ringed by stiff tentacles overhangs the mouth. This feature filters out large sediment particles but allows smaller, organic particles to pass so that they can be ingested.
filtering nets catch plankton
Coastal temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic, and Mediterranean
OCEAN LIFE
Pyrosoma spinosum
Sea Tulip
Appendicularian
excurrent siphon
SUBPHYLUM UROCHORDATA
SUBPHYLUM UROCHORDATA
This giant sea squirt is held up into the water on the end of a long, thin stalk. This means that its large inhalent siphon is in a better position to pull in plankton-rich water. The sea tulip’s body is covered in warty outgrowths and is naturally a bright yellow. However, the growth of an encrusting commensal sponge on many of these sea squirts gives them a pink appearance. During rough weather, sea tulips are often battered down onto the seabed, but they soon spring back on their flexible stalks.
Although it appears to be a solitary sea squirt, this species lives in urn-shaped colonies that share a single exhalent siphon (an opening through which water exits). The colony is dotted all over with the inhalent, or ingoing, siphons of the tiny zooids—the individuals that make up the colony. The colony’s green color results from the presence of the symbiotic cyanobacterium Prochloron.
SUBPHYLUM UROCHORDATA
321
322
animal life
JAWLESS FISHES JAWLESS FISH FORM AN ANCIENT group of vertebrates encompassing a diverse range of extinct groups. Today, KINGDOM Animalia there are only two small groups: the lampreys and the PHYLUM Chordata hagfish. They are considered to be the most primitive CLASSES Myxini living vertebrates, although many scientists do not Petromyzontida regard hagfish as true vertebrates. Hagfish and SPECIES About 88 lampreys look similar, with elongated bodies and jawless mouths, but the two groups evolved along separate lines. Lampreys live in temperate coastal waters throughout the world and swim up rivers to breed, although some remain in fresh water. Hagfish are exclusively marine. DOMAIN Eucarya
ANATOMY At first glance, lampreys and hagfish could easily be mistaken for eels LAMPREY MOUTH The oral disk, or sucker, of due to their long, thin bodies and slimy, scaleless skin. However, they lampreys is studded with horny lack a bony skeleton, and have only a simple flexible rod called a teeth arranged in roughly notochord running along the length of the body. In lampreys, the concentric rows. Larger teeth mouth is in the center of a round oral disk armed with small, rasping surround the central mouth opening. teeth. Hagfish have a slitlike mouth surrounded by fleshy barbels on the outside and by tooth plates on the dorsal fin gill openings inside. The gills in both groups open to the outside through small, BODY SECTION The bodies of lampreys (left) and hagfish are round pores behind the head, supported by a simple notochord flexed by a and there is a single nostril notochord series of muscle blocks along the back. With round, spinal cord on top of the head. no true bony vertebrae, this makes their fleshy mouth
bodies very flexible. They have a tail and dorsal fin, but lack paired fins.
HAGFISH
Hagfish find their way and detect carrion using fleshy barbels around the mouth. Their eyes are undeveloped and hidden beneath the skin, so they are nearly blind.
REPRODUCTION Lampreys migrate from the sea into rivers and move upstream to spawn. In gravel, females lay thousands of tiny white eggs, which hatch into wormlike larvae called ammocoetes. These simple creatures have a horseshoeshaped mouth without teeth. They live in muddy tunnels for about three years, feeding on debris, then transform into adults and swim out to sea. Hagfish lay a few large eggs on the sea bed, and these hatch into miniature adults.
HAGFISH EGGS
The eggs of hagfish are armed with tiny anchorlike hooks at both ends. When laid, they stick together like a string of sausages.
OCEAN LIFE
FEEDING With the exception of a few freshwater species, lampreys are parasitic, feeding on both bony and cartilaginous fish. They attach to their living host using the teeth and lips of their oral disk to suck onto their victim. Teeth in the mouth are then used to rasp a hole in the fish, and its flesh, blood, and body fluids are all consumed. Sometimes, lampreys cause the death of their host through blood loss or tissue damage. In contrast, hagfish are mostly scavengers that feed on dead fish and whale carcasses, as well as live invertebrates. They can gain leverage to tear off chunks of flesh by literally tying themselves in a knot and using the knot to brace themselves against the carcass. SHARK HOST
Large, slow-moving basking sharks are often parasitized by sea lampreys. The lampreys drop off when they have had their fill, leaving wounds that may get infected.
323 CLASS PETROMYZONTIDA
Sea Lamprey Petromyzon marinus LENGTH
Up to 4 ft (1.2 m) WEIGHT
Up to 51/2 lb (2.5 kg) DEPTH
3–2,100 ft (1–650 m) Coastal temperate waters of, and rivers adjacent to, north Atlantic DISTRIBUTION
With its long, cylindrical body, the sea lamprey might at first be mistaken for an eel, but closer inspection reveals differences. Unlike eels, the sea lamprey has no jaws. Its body is flattened toward the tail and it has two dorsal fins. Its circular mouth lies beneath the head, and is surrounded by a frill of tiny skin extensions. Inside the mouth, the teeth are arranged in numerous concentric arcs, which helps to distinguish it from the similar, but smaller, lampern (right). As a mature adult, the sea lamprey has dark
mottling on its back. Adults live at sea and feed on dead or netted fish as well as attacking a wide variety of live ones. It uses a “sucker” to attach to its host, scrapes a hole through the skin, and sucks out flesh and fluids. It spawns in rivers and the larvae remain in fresh water for about five years before they mature and move out to sea. This species is now rare as a result of trapping, intentional poisoning, and the degradation of its river habitat. CLASS PETROMYZONTIDA
Lampern Lampetra fluviatilis LENGTH
Up to 20 in (50 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 5 oz (150 g) DEPTH
0–30 ft (0–10 m) Coastal waters and rivers of northeastern Atlantic, northwestern Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
The lampern is also known as the river lamprey because the adults never stray far from the coast and often remain in estuaries. It may be distinguished from the sea lamprey (left) by its smaller size, uniform color, and the smaller number and different arrangement of its teeth. Larvae that hatch in rivers migrate to estuaries, where they spend a year or so feeding on herring, sprat, and flounder.
CLASS MYXINI
Hagfish Myxine glutinosa LENGTH
Up to 30 in
(80 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 13/4 lb
(750 g) 130–4,000 ft (40–1,200 m)
DEPTH
Coastal and shelf waters, below 55°F (13°C) in north Atlantic and western Mediterranean DISTRIBUTION
This extraordinary fish can literally tie itself in knots and it does so regularly as a means of ridding itself of excess slime. Special slime-exuding pores run along both sides of the eel-like body, enabling it to produce sufficient slime to fill a bucket in a matter of minutes. The glutinous slime is usually more than adequate to deter most predators. Like all jawless fish, the hagfish has no bony skeleton but simply a supporting flexible rod of cells,
called a notochord, allowing it great flexibility. Fleshy barbels surround its slitlike, jawless mouth, and it has only rudimentary eyes. There is a single pair of ventral gill openings about a third of the way along the body. The hagfish spends most of its time buried in mud with only the tip of the head showing. It mainly eats crustaceans but will scavenge on whale and fish carcasses. Once the hagfish has latched onto a carcass with its mouth, it forms a knot near its tail, then slides the knot forward in order to provide itself with sufficient leverage to tear its mouth away along with a chunk of food.
CLASS MYXINI
Pacific Hagfish Eptatretus stoutii LENGTH
and feeds mainly on carrion. It causes great damage to fish caught in static nets and will enter large fish through either the mouth or the anus and proceed to eat them from the inside out, consuming their guts and muscles.
Up to 20 in (50 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 3 lb (1.4 kg)
dorsal finfold
DEPTH
65–2,100 ft (20–650 m) Coastal and shelf waters of northeastern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
The Pacific hagfish is similar to the hagfish found in the Atlantic. It is usually a brownish red color and may have a blue or purple sheen. It has no true fins, only a dorsal finfold that continues around the tail but that has little function in swimming. The Pacific hagfish lives in soft mud
CLASS MYXINI
Japanese Hagfish LENGTH
Up to 24 in (60 cm) WEIGHT
Insufficient information DEPTH
30–900 ft (10–270 m) Inshore temperate waters of northwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Eptatretus burgeri
This species is also known as the Inshore Hagfish because it lives in relatively shallow water compared to other species of hagfish. It is similar in shape and size to the Pacific Hagfish, with six gill apertures and a white line along its back. It lives in the sublittoral zone, and usually buries itself in the bottom mud, but migrates to deeper water to breed. Unlike other species of hagfish, it reproduces seasonally; this is thought to be a response to changing temperatures in the shallow waters in which it lives.
324
animal life
CARTILAGINOUS FISHES
HUMAN IMPACT
THIS GROUP INCLUDES SHARKS, skates, rays, and deep-water fish called chimaeras. Within the group are some of Earth’s KINGDOM Animalia most efficient predators, such as the white shark, as well as PHYLUM Chordata filter feeders, such as the manta way. Some have features CLASS Chondrichthyes unusual for fish, such as large brains, live birth, and warm SUBCLASSES 2 blood. Fossils show that cartilaginous fishes have changed little SPECIES About 1,114 in form in hundreds of millions of years. All have a skeleton of cartilage, teeth that are replaced by new ones when snout nostril necessary, and toothlike scales covering their skin. mouth DOMAIN Eucarya
gill slits
ANATOMY
pectoral fin
The internal skeleton of all the fishes in this group is made from flexible cartilage. In some species, parts of the skull and skeleton are strengthened by mineral deposits. The teeth are covered by very hard enamel and are formidable weapons. Sharks have several rows of teeth lying flat behind the active ones. These gradually move forward, and individual teeth may be replaced as often as every 8–15 days. Cartilaginous fishes have extremely tough skin. It is extra-thick in female sharks because males use their teeth to hold pelvic fin onto them when mating. A shark’s skin is covered in tiny, backwardcloaca pointing, toothlike structures called dermal denticles, which feel like sandpaper. Rays have scattered denticles, some enlarged to form spines, tail while chimaeras have no denticles. Unlike bony fishes (see pp.338–41), cartilaginous fishes do not have a gas-filled first dorsal fin swim bladder. Sharks living in the open ocean, however, often have a very large, oil-filled liver, which aids buoyancy.
RAY BODY SHAPE
Skates and rays have flat bodies and large pectoral fins. The mouth is on the underside, so water for breathing is sucked in through a pair of holes, called spiracles, on the upper side, then passed over the gills.
gill slit
second dorsal fin eye
anal fin
pelvic fin
SHARK BODY SHAPE
A typical shark has a sleek, streamlined body. The tail is asymmetrical (heterocercal) to give lift, and the paired pelvic fins are set far back. The mouth is underslung, and there are five gill slits on each side. daggerlike point grips flesh
OCEAN LIFE
SANDTIGER SHARK
underslung mouth pectoral fin
heterocercal tail
serrated, bladelike edge cuts like a knife
TIGER SHARK palate, covered with flat teeth, crushes food
RAY
TOOTH ADAPTATIONS
Sharks’ teeth are shaped to suit their diet. Pointed ones are used for holding, while serrated teeth slice chunks from prey. Rays and chimaeras have teeth like grindstones to crush hard crustaceans and mollusks.
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SHARK FINS
Thousands of sharks are killed every year for their valuable fins, which are dried and then made into shark-fin soup. The body is often discarded while the shark is still alive.
CARTILAGINOUS FISH CLASSIFICATION
REPRODUCTION In all cartilaginous fishes, the eggs are fertilized inside the female’s body. Adult males have organs on the belly called claspers—rodlike appendages that are a part of the pelvic fins. During mating, one or both claspers are inserted into the female’s cloaca (the shared opening of the digestive and reproductive tracts) to introduce the sperm. In sharks, mating can be a rough affair, although there may be some courtship. Chimaeras, as well as some sharks and rays, lay eggs— CATSHARK EGGS that is, they are oviparous. The eggs are protected These egg capsules by individual leathery egg capsules, often known as contain catshark mermaid’s purses. The young then hatch out several embryos, which will months later. In contrast, most sharks and rays give hatch after about birth to live young after a long period of gestation. a year. The tendrils anchor the capsules Of these, some are ovoviviparous, while the rest are to seaweeds. viviparous. In ovoviviparous species, the eggs simply remain inside the mother until they hatch, prior to birth. In viviparous species, representing about 10 percent of sharks, the young develop attached to a placenta-like structure and are directly nourished by the female’s body. In all cases, the young are born fully formed, and they are able to hunt and feed. Immediately after birth, the female swims away and the young are left to fend for themselves.
Cartilaginous fishes are divided into two subclasses: sharks and rays (the Elasmobranchii); and chimaeras (the Holocephali), which include ratfish and rabbitfish. Sharks and rays comprise nine orders, one of which is rays. Rays are divided into four suborders—considered by some to be orders. Chimaeras have one order, the Chimaeriformes. CHIMAERAS Order Chimaeriformes
BULLHEAD AND HORN SHARKS Order Heterodontiformes
About 34 species
9 species
The only member of subclass Holocephali, this order is distinct from sharks and rays and includes rabbitfish and ratfish. Chimaeras have a long, flabby body without scales, a large head with sensory canals, platelike teeth, and one gill opening. The first of two dorsal fins is erectile with a venomous spine. Reproduction is oviparous.
Small, bottom-living sharks, these species have pointed front teeth and molarlike back teeth, a blunt, sloping head, nostrils connected to the mouth by a groove, paddlelike pectoral fins, an anal fin, and two spined dorsal fins. They are oviparous.
FRILL AND COW SHARKS Order Hexanchiformes 6 species
These sharks have a long, thin body, six or seven pairs of gill slits, small spiracles, and a single dorsal fin near the tail. Frill sharks have three-pointed teeth; cow sharks’ teeth are sawlike. Reproduction is ovoviviparous.
Lemon sharks move to shallow, sheltered bays or lagoons to give birth. The young emerge tail first and swim away. The mothers then leave the nursery grounds.
Seven families form this large, varied order: bramble, dogfish, rough, lantern, sleeper, gulper, and kitefin sharks. All have spiracles, five gill slits, and two dorsal fins, but no anal fin. They are ovoviviparous.
These mainly bottom-living sharks include wobbegongs and nurse sharks. They have a broad, flattened head, barbels, and nostrils joined to the mouth by a deep groove. They have an anal fin and two spineless dorsal fins. Reproductive strategies vary.
This order is made up of large, ovoviviparous sharks with a cylindrical body, conical head, two dorsal fins, an anal fin, and a long upper tail lobe. The white, basking, and megamouth sharks are all members. Many can maintain a high body temperature. GROUND SHARKS Order Carcharhiniformes About 225 species
9 species
The broad head of this shark provides space for extra electrical sense organs on the snout and gives a wide field of view, making it a formidable hunter.
About 33 species
15 species
SAWSHARKS Order Pristiophoriformes
HAMMERHEAD SHARK
CARPETSHARKS Order Orectolobiformes
MACKEREL SHARKS Order Lamniformes
BRAMBLE, SLEEPER, AND DOGFISH SHARKS Order Squaliformes 130 species
LEMON SHARK BIRTH
325
Small, slender sharks, these species have a flattened head and sawlike snout with barbels. They have two spineless dorsal fins, no anal fin, and are ovoviviparous. ANGELSHARKS Order Squatiniformes
This is the largest and most diverse shark group. Body shapes vary, but most species are large. All species have two spineless dorsal fins and an anal fin. Reproductive strategies vary. RAYS AND SKATES Order Rajiformes
20 species
Over 600 species
These flattened, raylike sharks have a rounded head with gill slits on the side, and spiracles. They have large pectoral and pelvic fins, two small dorsal fins, but no anal fin. Reproduction is ovoviviparous.
These are mostly bottom-living fish with a flat, disk-shaped body, winglike pectoral fins joined to the head, and a long, thin tail. Reproduction is mostly viviparous with many live young, but some are oviparous.
HUNTING SENSES
AMPULLAE OF LORENZINI
The black spots on a shark’s snout are tiny electrical sense organs that help it find prey even in complete darkness.
BARBELS
Active at night, nurse sharks can find buried prey by touch and smell, using their sensory barbels.
OCEAN LIFE
Cartilaginous fishes have acute senses that help them to find prey, even if it is distant or buried in sediment. Predatory sharks smell or taste tiny amounts of blood as water passes over highly sensitive membranes in their nostrils, while catsharks also use smell to recognize each other. All cartilaginous fish have a system of pores called ampullae of Lorenzini that allows them to detect weak electrical signals given off by other animals. Most also have a lateral-line system, similar to that of bony fishes, which detects water movements. Cartilaginous fishes have eyes similar to those of mammals, and most have acute vision. They have no eyelids, but some sharks have a transparent “nictitating membrane,” which protects their eyes when they are attacking prey.
326 ORDER CHIMAERIFORMES
Pacific Spookfish Rhinochimaera pacifica LENGTH
About 41/4 ft
(1.3 m), plus tail filament WEIGHT
Not recorded
1,100–4,900 ft (330–1,500 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Parts of Pacific and eastern Indian
Ocean
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ORDER CHIMAERIFORMES
Plownose Chimaera Callorhinchus milii LENGTH
Up to about 41/4 ft (1.3 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
At least 750 ft (230 m) Temperate waters in the southwest Pacific, off southern Australia and along the east coast of South Island, New Zealand
DISTRIBUTION
The plownose chimaera is also known as the elephant fish due to its most distinctive feature, a long, fleshy snout. The plownose uses this bizarre appendage to snuffle through mud of the ocean floor in search of shellfish, which it crunches up using its plate-like teeth. A network of prominent sensory canals crisscrosses its head. In spring, these fish come inshore into estuaries and bays to breed, and lay their eggs in horny, yellow-brown capsules. This chimaera is fished commercially for food.
-ATINGUNDERWATERISASLIPPERY BUSINESS SOTHEMALEPLOWNOSE CHIMAERAHASARETRACTABLE CLUBLIKE SPINYCLASPERONITSHEAD THATHELPSITHANGONTOTHEFEMALE 4HEMALETRANSFERSHISSPERM WHENHEINSERTSHISPELVICCLASPER INTOTHEFEMALESCLOACA retractable clasper
ORDER CHIMAERIFORMES
Rabbit Fish Chimaera monstrosa LENGTH WEIGHT
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m) Up to 51/2 lb
(2.5 kg) Typically 1,000–1,300 ft (300–400 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER CHIMAERIFORMES
Spotted Ratfish Hydrolagus colliei LENGTH
Up to 31/4 ft
(1 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded
Close inshore to at least 2,950 ft (900 m)
DEPTH
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
Northeastern Pacific
The scientific name of the spotted ratfish means “water rabbit,” and it is also called the blunt-nosed chimaera. It belongs to the same family as the rabbit fish (see right) and is similar in shape, but unlike its relative, it does not have an anal fin on the underside next to the tail. Its pattern of white spots on a dark background may provide camouflage in the same way as the
spots help to camouflage deer in a forest. The spotted ratfish uses its large pectoral fins to glide and flap its way over the seabed in search of its prey, which consists mainly of mollusks and crustaceans. Like other chimaeras, the female lays eggs, each one encased in a tadpole-shaped, protective capsule. The eggs are laid in the summer, two at a time, and are dropped onto the seabed. The spotted ratfish is not fished commercially, since it is not very palatable, although it is sometimes unintentionally caught in nets along with other fish. It is not popular with fishermen because it has the ability to inflict a nasty wound with its sharp dorsal spine and can also deliver a painful bite. The spotted ratfish is frequently encountered at night by scuba divers, its large eyes glowing green by flashlight.
Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
Beautifully patterned with wavy brown and white lines, the rabbit fish belongs to a family called Chimaeridae, whose members have rounded snouts, long, tapering bodies,
When scientists first hauled a Pacific spookfish up from the ocean depths, they were astonished by the sight of its enormously long, conical snout. The long, brownish body of this strangelooking fish tapers to a thin tail, so that the fish gives the impression of being pointed at both ends. The snout is whitish, flexible, and covered in sensory pores and canals. Living in the dark depths of the ocean where its small eyes are of at best limited use, the spookfish uses its snout to find food and sense objects around it. The beak-shaped mouth under the base of the snout contains pairs of black, platelike teeth. Its tail has only a small lower lobe, while the upper lobe consists of a row of fleshy tubercles. Like other chimaeras, the spookfish relies mainly on its pectoral fins for propulsion rather than using its tail as most species of fish do. A very similar species of spookfish is found in the Atlantic Ocean. and tails ending in a long, thin filament, giving rise to their alternative name of ratfishes. The long, sharp spine in front of the first dorsal fin of the rabbit fish is venomous and can inflict a serious wound. Unlike sharks but in common with all other chimaeras, the rabbit fish can raise and lower this fin. The second dorsal fin is low and long and almost reaches the tail fin. Rabbit fish swim sluggishly in small groups and feed mainly on seabed invertebrates using their paired, rabbitlike teeth. These fish are often caught by accident in shrimp nets in the North Sea.
cartilaginous fishes ORDER HEXANCHIFORMES
Frilled Shark Chlamydoselachus anguineus LENGTH
Up to 61/2 ft
(2 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded
Mostly 400–5,150 ft (120–1,570 m ) DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide but discontinuous
ORDER HEXANCHIFORMES
Sharpnose Sevengill Shark Heptranchias perlo LENGTH
Up to 41/2 ft
With its elongated, eel-like body and flattened head, the frilled shark bears little resemblance to other sharks. The most noticeable difference is that its mouth is at the front of its head instead of on the underside. In addition, while most modern sharks have five pairs of gill slits, the frilled shark has six, each with a frilled edge. Its small teeth are also unusual, each having three sharp points. Frilled sharks have been observed swimming with their mouths open, displaying their conspicuous white teeth, leading to the suspicion that the teeth act as a lure for prey. This shark lives near the seabed in deep water but
occasionally comes to the surface. It feeds on deep-water fish and squid. The male has two long claspers on the belly, which are used to transfer sperm to the female when mating. This species is ovoviviparous, meaning that the eggs hatch inside the mother, which then gives birth to live young. Up to 12 young are born as long as two years after fertilization. Trawlers fishing for other deep-sea species often catch frilled sharks as by-catch. Because this species reproduces so infrequently, it is especially vulnerable, and is listed as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List of endangered species.
species that have seven gill slits—more than any other living shark species. It lives in deep water and hunts squid, crustaceans, and fish near the seabed. Like the sixgill sharks (see above), it has comblike teeth.Young fish have black markings, which fade with age,
on the tip of the single dorsal fin and on the upper part of the tail. Females are ovoviviparous and give birth to 6–20 young at one time.The sharpnose sevengill shark is rarely seen alive and little is known of its feeding and breeding behavior, but it is lively and
327
ORDER HEXANCHIFORMES
Bluntnose Sixgill Shark Hexanchus griseus LENGTH
Up to 18 ft
(5.5 m) Up to at least 1,300 lb (600 kg)
WEIGHT
Up to 7,550 ft (2,300 m)
DEPTH DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and temperate waters
worldwide
This enormous deep-water shark is sometimes spotted by divers in shallow water at night, but its more usual haunt is rocky seamounts and mid-ocean ridges. Its thick-set, powerful body has one dorsal fin, a large mouth lined with comb-like teeth, and six gill slits. Its fins are soft and flexible, not rigid like those of most sharks. Fish, rays, squid, and bottom-living invertebrates are this shark’s typical prey, although larger adults sometimes also hunt for seals and cetaceans.
aggressive on the rare occasions when it is captured. It is occasionally caught up as by-catch in trawl nets, and this may be contributing to a reduction in its numbers. It is listed as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List of endangered species.
(1.4 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded
Up to 3,300 ft (1,000 m), typically 90–2,360 ft (27–720 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION Tropical and temperate waters worldwide, except northeastern Pacific
The sharpnose sevengill shark, as its name suggests, has a sharply pointed snout and is one of only two shark
ORDER SQUALIFORMES
Piked Dogfish Squalus acanthias LENGTH
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 20 lb (9 kg)
DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide, except tropics and polar
waters
Sharks are not normally shoaling fish, but piked dogfish aggregate into huge groups numbering thousands of individuals, often all of one sex and
OCEAN LIFE
Up to 4,800 ft (1,460 m), typically 0–2,000 ft (0–600 m)
DEPTH
size. Also known as the spurdog or spiny dogfish, this sleek, dark gray shark has two dorsal fins, each with a sharp spine in front of it. Irregular white spots decorate its sides, especially in young fish, and it has a pointed snout and large oval eyes. It was once very common and was possibly the most abundant species of shark, but it is now threatened globally as a result of overfishing. These sharks do not begin to breed until they are 10–25 years old and may live to be 70–100 years old. They grow very slowly, and the young take up to two years to develop inside the mother. Some populations migrate thousands of miles seasonally in order to avoid very cold water.
328
animal life ORDER SQUALIFORMES
ORDER SQUALIFORMES
Velvet Belly Lanternshark
Greenland Shark Somniosus microcephalus
Etmopterus spinax
LENGTH 8–14 ft (2.4–4.3 m)
Up to 18 in (45 cm), rarely 24 in (60 cm LENGTH
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
0–4,000 ft (0–1,200 m)
DEPTH
Typically 650–1,650 ft (200–500 m), up to 8,200 ft (2,500 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Up to 1,710 lb
(775 kg)
Up to 2 lb (850 g) DISTRIBUTION
North Atlantic and Arctic waters
The sluggish Greenland shark has a heavy, cylindrical body that is usually brown or gray. It has a short, rounded snout and two equal-sized dorsal fins. As well as feeding on a variety of live prey, including fish, sea birds, and seals, this shark is also a scavenger, often eating dead cetaceans and drowned land animals, such as reindeer. It is often caught by hook-and-line at ice holes while it hunts seals, but its flesh is poisonous and must be boiled several times before it becomes edible.
Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
As this small shark searches for fish and squid in the darkness, its black belly is illuminated by tiny, bright light organs called photophores. It has large eyes and two dorsal fins, each with a strong, grooved spine in front. It is one of about 30 similar species that include the smallest known sharks.
broad, interlocking teeth on lower jaw
ORDER SQUATINIFORMES
Pacific Angel Shark Squatina californica LENGTH
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 60 lb
(27 kg) Typically 0– 1,000 ft (0–300 m), up to 610 ft (185 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Continental shelf of the eastern
Pacific
Resembling something between a squashed shark and a ray, the Pacific angel shark spends most of its time lying quietly on the seabed. Its sandy or gray back, peppered with dark spots and scattered dark rings, provides good camouflage. Though superficially similar to a ray, this fish is marked out as a true shark by the gill slits on the side of its head, while rays have their
gills underneath. It draws water in through large, paired holes called spiracles behind its eyes and pumps it over the gills. Rearing up like a cobra, the Pacific angel shark ambushes passing fish including halibut, croakers, and other bottom-dwellers. It has also been known to snap at divers and fishermen who have provoked it. At night, it swims for short distances above the seabed, sculling along with its tail. Females give birth to litters of six to ten pups after a gestation of nine to ten months.Young fish do not mature until they are at least ten years old and can live until they are 35 years old. This fish used to be abundant in the waters off California until intense fishing caused a population collapse in the 1990s. A gill net ban ended the fishery. This shark is categorized as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List of endangered species.
ORDER SQUALIFORMES
Cookiecutter Shark Isistius brasiliensis LENGTH
Up to 22 in
(56 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded
0–11,500 ft (0–3,500 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic, Pacific, and southern
Indian Ocean
ORDER PRISTIOPHORIFORMES
Longnose Sawshark Pristiophorus cirratus LENGTH
Up to 41/2 ft
(1.4 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded
130–1,200 ft (40–310 m)
DEPTH
Temperate and subtropical waters of southern Australia
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
Many cetaceans and large fish, including other sharks, suffer when cookiecutter sharks are around. This small, cigar-shaped shark is a parasite that bites chunks out of its prey. Using its unique thick, flexible lips to hold onto its victim by suction, it then twists itself around so that its razor-sharp lower teeth bite out a cookie-shaped piece of flesh. It is active at night, luring its victims with glowing green bioluminescent lights on its belly. It also preys on squid and crustaceans. Like all sawsharks, this species has a head that is flattened and extended to form a long, saw-like projection, or rostrum. This is edged with rows of large, sharp teeth. Two long sensory barbels hang down from the underside of the rostrum, which is studded with further sense organs, and the shark uses these to detect vibrations and electrical fields. It seeks out and kills prey, such as fish and crustaceans, by poking around on the seabed and slashing out sideways with its rostrum.
cartilaginous fishes ORDER ORECTOLOBIFORMES
Tasseled Wobbegong Orectolobus dasypogon At least 41/4 ft
LENGTH
(1.3 m) WEIGHT DEPTH
Not recorded
At least 130 ft
(40 m) DISTRIBUTION Southwestern Pacific off northern Australia and Papua New Guinea
eye on prominent ridge
While it lies still, the tasseled wobbegong looks like a seaweedcovered rock, which is exactly its objective. It is one of a group of flattened, bottom-living sharks that are masters of camouflage. The squashed shape and broad, paired fins are further adaptations to an existence on the ocean floor. This species has a beautiful reticulated pattern of narrow, dark lines against a paler background. Around its mouth is a fringe of skin flaps that resemble weeds. During the day, it rests unseen under overhangs
ORDER HETERODONTIFORMES
and ledges on coral reefs. At night, this highly successful ambush predator emerges onto the reef to find a good vantage point from which to snap up passing fish. There is no escape from the gape of its huge jaws and its needlelike teeth for any fish straying near, as the tasseled wobbegong lunges up and grabs its prey. This species has been reported to bite divers who disturb it. Little is yet known of its biology, and reef destruction and overfishing have reduced its numbers.
ORDER ORECTOLOBIFORMES
Port Jackson Shark
Zebra Shark
Heterodontus portusjacksoni
Stegostoma fasciatum
LENGTH
Up to 51/2 ft
LENGTH
(1.7 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded
WEIGHT
0–900 ft (0–275 m)
Temperate waters off southern Australia and possibly New Zealand
DISTRIBUTION
4HETASSELEDWOBBEGONGLOOKS REMARKABLYSIMILARTOTHEANGLER SEEP WHICHISANUNRELATED SPECIESOFBONYFISH"OTHOF THESEPREDATORS WHICHSPECIALIZE INAMBUSHINGTHEIRPREY ARE FLATTENED HAVEBROADHEADS WIDEMOUTHSDISGUISEDBYSKIN FLAPS ANDSHARP POINTEDTEETH &OLLOWINGASIMILARLIFESTYLE THESE TWOSPECIESHAVECOMEUPWITH SIMILARANSWERS ANEXAMPLEOF CONVERGENTEVOLUTION
ORDER ORECTOLOBIFORMES
Tawny Nurse Shark Nebrius ferrugineus Up to 8 ft
LENGTH
Not recorded
WEIGHT
0–210 ft (0–63 m)
Indian Ocean and southwestern
Pacific
The zebra shark is often seen by divers around coral reefs. Its long, ridged body and densely spotted skin make it unmistakable. Juveniles have stripes instead of spots and no ridges. This shark spends most of the day lying on the reef, usually facing into the current. At night, it squirms its flexible body into cracks and crevices on the reef, searching for mollusks, crustaceans, and small fish.
Not recorded
3–230 ft (1–70 m), typically 100 ft (30 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Up to 101/2 ft
(3.2 m) DEPTH
Indian Ocean, western and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
The docile, bottom-living tawny nurse shark is a favorite with underwater photographers because, although it may bite if harassed, it can be approached closely. During the day, it rests quietly in caves and channels in coral reefs, emerging at night to hunt for invertebrates. A pair of long sensory barbels on either side of the mouth helps the shark to find its prey, which it crushes using wide teeth.
OCEAN LIFE
This small shark belongs to a group of about nine sluggish, bottom-living sharks called bullhead or horn sharks. It has two dorsal fins, each with a short spine, and large, paddlelike, paired fins. It is a poor swimmer and uses its fins to crawl over the seabed at night in search of sea urchins, which it grabs using its pointed front teeth and crushes using broad rear teeth. Females lay unusual spiral egg cases, which they wedge into crevices.
dorsal fin
-)3,%!$).' 3)-),!2)49
(2.4 m)
DEPTH
329
330
ORDER ORECTOLOBIFORMES
Whale Shark Rhincodon typus 40–65 ft (12–20 m) LENGTH
Over 13 tons (12 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Surface, deep water in winter
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and temperate waters
worldwide
The whale shark is a graceful, slowmoving giant and the largest fish in the world. At 5 ft (1.5 m) wide, its mouth is large enough to fit a human
inside, but it is a harmless filter feeder that eats only plankton and small fish. To obtain the huge amount of food it needs, it sucks water into its mouth and pumps it out over its gills, where particles of food become trapped by bony projections called gill rakers and are later swallowed. This shark has the thickest skin of any animal, at up to 4 in (10 cm) thick. Prominent ridges
ORDER LAMNIFORMES
run the length of its body, and it has a large, sickle-shaped tail. The pattern of white spots on its back is unique to each fish, enabling scientists, through analysis of photographs, to identify individuals. While little is known of their ocean travels, satellite tagging has shown that some whale sharks migrate across entire oceans. Whale shark eggs hatch inside the mother, and she gives birth to live young. Whale sharks are killed for their meat and fins (used in soup), although they are legally protected in some countries.
ORDER LAMNIFORMES
Megamouth Shark
Sandtiger Shark
Megachasma pelagios
Carcharias taurus
At least 18 ft (5.5 m) LENGTH
WEIGHT
LENGTH
Not recorded
WEIGHT
Little known, but probably worldwide
in the tropics
This gigantic shark was discovered as recently as 1976, when one became entangled in the folds of a ship’s sea anchor. Like the whale shark and
ORDER LAMNIFORMES
Basking Shark Cetorhinus maximus LENGTH 20–36 ft (6–11 m)
Up to 7.7 tons (7 metric tons)
OCEAN LIFE
WEIGHT
0–6,500 ft (0–2,000 m)
DEPTH
Cold- to warm-temperate coastal waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
The world’s second-largest fish, the basking shark is protected in several countries. In summer, it swims openmouthed at the surface, filtering out plankton. Every hour, the shark passes
Up to 350 lb
(160 kg)
0–540 ft (0–165 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Up to 101/2 ft
(3.2 m)
DEPTH
basking shark, it is a filter feeder, gulping down huge mouthfuls of shrimp, which it probably compresses with its huge tongue. At night it follows the shrimp toward the surface and is thought to attract them with bioluminescent tissue inside its mouth. up to 395,000 gallons (1.5 million liters) of seawater through the huge gills that almost encircle its head. Its liver runs the length of the abdominal cavity and is filled with oil to aid buoyancy.
0–625 ft (0–190 m)
Warm-temperate and tropical coastal waters, except eastern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Also known as the ragged-tooth shark and the gray nurse shark, the sandtiger shark is fearsome to look at. It is heavily built and its daggerlike, menacing teeth protrude, even when its mouth is closed. Many people will have seen these sharks in aquariums,
&%!34).'/. 0,!.+4/. %VERYYEAR AROUND!PRIL WHALE SHARKSMIGRATETO.INGALOO2EEF OFFNORTHWESTERN!USTRALIAFORA PLANKTONFEAST4HEPLANKTON EXPLOSIONRESULTSFROMA SIMULTANEOUSMASSSPAWNING OFTHEREEFSCORALS POSSIBLY TRIGGEREDBYTHEFULLMOON
and they are quite docile in captivity despite their chilling appearance. The sandtiger shark has a flattened, conical snout, is light brown in color, and its body is often speckled with darker spots. It lives in shallow coastal waters, especially on reefs and in rough, rocky areas with gullies and caves. Although it spends most of its time near the sea floor, it can hover in mid-water by filling its stomach with air gulped in at the surface. The mother gives birth to two live young at a time, one from each of a pair of uteruses. Within each uterus there are many other embryos, and the strongest embryo in each uterus kills and eats its siblings along with any unfertilized eggs before it is born. Sandtiger sharks are widely hunted for both sport and food.
cartilaginous fishes ORDER LAMNIFORMES
HUMAN IMPACT
White Shark
3(!2+!44!#+
Carcharodon carcharias LENGTH
Up to 24 ft
(7.2 m) Over 3.7 tons (3.4 metric tons)
WEIGHT
0–4,300 ft (0–1,300 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION Wide range through most oceans except polar waters
The white shark, or great white, is one of the most powerful predators in the ocean and has a reputation as a killing machine. In fact, this shark is intelligent and capable of complex social interactions. It is, however, first and foremost a predator, feeding on prey that ranges from small fish to tuna, marine mammals (such as porpoises, seals, and sea lions), and birds (such as gannets and penguins). Its powerful, tapered body and crescent-shaped tail are designed for sudden, swift attack, which may occur with such momentum that the shark leaves the water. It can sustain high speeds even in cold waters because it can maintain a body temperature well above that of the surrounding water due to adaptations in its circulatory system. This means that the shark’s metabolism is more efficient than that of other sharks, allowing it to swim faster and with greater endurance. Large numbers of these sharks are attracted to areas where there are sea mammal colonies, such as off South Africa. Satellite tags have shown that they can migrate huge distances. Their numbers are declining due to sport fishing, netting, and commercial bycatch.
4HEWHITESHARKHASMADEMORE UNPROVOKEDATTACKSONHUMANS THANANYOTHERSHARK(OWEVER HUMANSARENOTITSNATURALPREY ANDMANYSUCHATTACKSCANBE PUTDOWNTOTHESHARKMISTAKING ADIVERFORASEALORTURTLE7HEN STIMULATEDBYBAITINTHEWATER WHITESHARKSWILLBITEANYTHING EVENAMETALDIVINGCAGE
serrated edge
COUNTER-SHADED COLORATION
From above, the shark’s dark back merges with the seabed; from below, its white belly blends with the down-welling light.
FEARSOME TEETH
This shark’s teeth can be up to 3 in (7.5 cm) long. They are as hard as steel with razor-sharp, serrated edges that can slice through the toughest flesh.
ORDER LAMNIFORMES
ORDER CARCHARHINIFORMES
Goblin Shark
Chain Catshark
Mitsukurina owstoni
Scyliorhinus retifer
Up to 123/4 ft (3.9 m) LENGTH
WEIGHT
331
LENGTH
11/2 ft (0.5 m)
Up to 460 lb
WEIGHT
(210 kg)
Not recorded
1,000–4,300 ft (300–1,300 m)
DEPTH
115–1,800 ft (35–550 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION Not fully known, but thought to be in temperate and tropical waters
this shark except that it gives birth to live young and after death changes from pinkish to a dirty, brownish gray color. Only a few dozen goblin sharks have officially been caught, and this species is thought to be rare. Most data has come from sharks caught by boats fishing for deep-water fish using long lines. Fossils of sharks very similar to this species have been found in rocks over 100 million years old.
North and western Atlantic,
OCEAN LIFE
One of the strangest-looking of all deep-water sharks, the goblin shark is pale pink, with a flabby body, tiny eyes, and a long, flattened, bill-like snout. This strange projection is covered in electroreceptors and is probably used to detect prey in the inky depths. Beneath the snout, the goblin shark has specialized jaws that can be shot forward to grab fish and octopuses using long, pointed teeth. Not very much else is known about
DISTRIBUTION
Caribbean
With its chain-link pattern, this shark (also known as the chain catfish) is unmistakable. It is one of about 90 catsharks that make up the largest shark family, Scyliorhinidae. Living on the seabed, it feeds on worms, crustaceans, and small fish. Deep furrows connect the nostrils to the mouth, and the eyes are catlike. Catsharks lay 40–50 eggs per year in horny capsules with long tendrils at each corner. The empty cases may be washed ashore and are known as mermaid’s purses.
WHITE SHARK
One of the world’s most formidable predators, the white shark catches its prey with a short, fast attack, typically from below. Sometimes its speed takes it and its prey (in this case, a seal) clear of the water. The shark then often withdraws to wait for its victim to weaken before returning to finish it off.
334 ORDER CARCHARHINIFORMES
Blue Shark Prionace glauca LENGTH
Up to 13 ft (4 m) WEIGHT
Up to 450 lb (200 kg) DEPTH
0–1,150 ft (0–350 m) Temperate and tropical waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
A true ocean wanderer, the blue shark makes seasonal trans-ocean crossings in search of food. It is streamlined and elegant, with a long, pointed snout, and characteristic white-rimmed black eyes. On long journeys, it may use its winglike pectoral fins to help it glide on ocean currents. On the way, it makes frequent, deep dives, possibly to help it get its magnetic bearings. When chasing fish, this shark may reach speeds of 43 mph (70 km/h). It has been known to harass swimmers and has caused a few human fatalities. Although one of the most common sharks, it is also the most exploited and its populations are declining.
ORDER CARCHARHINIFORMES
Scalloped Hammerhead Shark Sphyrna lewini LENGTH
Up to 14 ft (4.3 m) WEIGHT
Up to 330 lb (150 kg) DEPTH
0–1,640 ft (0–500 m) ORDER CARCHARHINIFORMES
Tiger Shark Galeocerdo cuvier LENGTH
Up to 24 ft (7.4 m) WEIGHT
Up to 1,750 lb (800 kg) DEPTH
To 1,150 ft (350 m) DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and warm temperate waters
worldwide
The tiger shark is the second most dangerous shark to humans, after the white shark (see p.331). It is huge and has a heavy head and a mouth filled
ORDER CARCHARHINIFORMES
OCEAN LIFE
Whitetip Reef Shark Triaenodon obesus LENGTH
Up to 61/2 ft (2 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 37 lb
(18 kg) Typically 25–130 ft (8–40 m), recorded at 1,080 ft (330 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
and Pacific
Tropical waters of the Indian Ocean
with serrated teeth that have the characteristic shape of a cockscomb. One reason it is so dangerous is that it prefers coastal waters and is also found in river estuaries and harbors, and so it frequently comes into contact with humans. It is reputed to eat almost anything—as well as eating smaller sharks, including its own young, other fish, marine mammals, turtles, and birds, it is an inveterate scavenger, and a huge variety of garbage has been found in tiger shark stomachs. The young, born live after hatching from eggs inside the mother, begin life marked with blotches, which become “tiger stripes” in juveniles and fade by adulthood. One of the sharks most often seen by divers is the whitetip reef shark, which during the day may be found around coral reefs resting in caves and gullies, often in groups. The tip of its first dorsal fin and the upper tip of its tail are white, in contrast to its grayish brown back. At night, the whitetip comes out to hunt reef fish, octopus, lobsters, and crabs hidden among the coral. Packs sometimes hunt together, sniffing out the prey and bumping and banging the coral to get at them.
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and warm temperate waters
worldwide
Along with the seven other known species of hammerhead sharks, the scalloped hammerhead has a strange, flattened, T-shaped head. In this
species, the front of the head has three notches, which produces the scalloped shape from which it takes its name. The eyes are located at the sides of the head. Hunting near the seabed, the shark swings its head from side to side, looking for prey such as fish, other sharks, octopus, and crustaceans, and using sensory pits on its head to detect the electrical fields of buried prey such as rays. The head may also function as an airfoil, giving the shark lift and helping it to twist and turn as it chases its prey. Scalloped hammerheads may be seen in large shoals of over a hundred individuals. They give birth to live young in shallow bays and estuaries, where the skin of the young darkens to give protection against sunlight.
cartilaginous fishes ORDER RAJIFORMES
Common Skate Dipturus batis LENGTH
Up to 91/2 ft (3 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 220 lb
(100 kg) 330–3,300 ft (100–1,000 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION Eastern Atlantic from northern Europe to southern Africa, Mediterranean
The common skate is the largest and heaviest of the European rays. Due to overexploitation, it is now a rare species throughout most of its range and has become extinct in some
ORDER RAJIFORMES
Atlantic Guitarfish Rhinobatos lentiginosus LENGTH
Up to 30 in (75 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
0–100 ft (0–30 m) Coastal waters of Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean, and western Atlantic DISTRIBUTION
ORDER RAJIFORMES
Painted Ray Raja undulata LENGTH
Up to 4 ft (1.2 m) WEIGHT
Up to 15 lb (7 kg) DEPTH
150–650 ft (45–200 m) DISTRIBUTION
Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
regions. Its snout is long and pointed, and the front margin of the wings is strongly concave, giving this skate an overall angular shape. Its tail has a row of spines along its length but, unlike the large stinging spine of stingrays, these are not venomous. This species is sometimes called the blue skate because its underside is bluish gray. It can swim strongly and feeds on fish in mid-water as well as hunting over the seabed for crabs, lobsters, bottom-dwelling fish, and other rays. Its oblong egg cases are up to 10 in (25 cm) long. They are laid in fall or winter and hatch two to five months later. While mature specimens prefer deeper water, the young will spend time in shallow waters.
Guitarfish are elongated rays with a triangular snout and narrow pectoral fins. Like sharks, these rays use their spineless tails for swimming, while other rays swim by flapping only their pectoral fins. The Atlantic guitarfish has two small dorsal fins set far back near the tip of its tail. Grayish brown with small white spots, it blends in with the sandy seabed, but this ray can be seen in shallow water searching for mollusks and crabs, probing the sand with its snout. Females are ovoviviparous, giving birth to about six live young. Also known as the undulate ray, the painted ray is one of the most distinctive northern European rays. This species is patterned with long, wavy, dark lines edged with white spots that run parallel to the wing margins. Its ornate appearance makes it an attractive species for aquariums, but in its natural habitat, this pattern has the practical advantage of helping the ray to blend in with the gravel and sand on the seabed, where it feeds on flatfish, crabs, and other bottom-living invertebrates. The biology of this beautiful ray has not been fully studied, but during the breeding season, males use paired claspers to transfer sperm during mating, and females are known to lay up to 15 eggs in muddy or sandy flats. Each egg is encased in a reddishbrown, oblong egg capsule up to 3½ in (9 cm) long, with a curved horn at each corner. Additional information on the distribution and status of this and other rays around Britain is currently being collected through an egg-case identification project. Members of the public are encouraged to collect empty egg cases that have been washed ashore, rehydrate them, and identify them. The number and location of egg cases found are collated each year. dorsal fin
ORDER RAJIFORMES
Reticulate Whipray Himantura uarnak LENGTH About 15 ft (4.5 m) including tail WEIGHT
About 265 lb
(120 kg) 65–165 ft (20–50 m)
DEPTH
ORDER RAJIFORMES
Smalltooth Sawfish Pristis pectinata LENGTH
Up to 25 ft (7.6 m) WEIGHT
Up to 770 lb (350 kg) DEPTH
0–33 ft (0–10 m) DISTRIBUTION
Subtropical waters in all oceans
Sawfish are elongated rays with a long, flat, sawlike snout, or rostrum, which they use to slash through shoals of fish and dig for shellfish and invertebrates. Like all rays, they have gill slits on the underside of the body rather than the sides. Females give birth to live young, which are about 2 ft (60 cm) long in the smalltooth species. The saws of the pups are sheathed and flexible at birth, in order to prevent injury to the mother. The smalltooth sawfish lives in coastal waters but also swims up river estuaries. Numbers of this species are severely depleted and it is listed as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List of endangered species.
Coastal waters of Arabian Gulf, Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This beautifully patterned stingray belongs to a group called whiprays, which have long, thin, flexible tails. Its upper surface is densely covered with wavy brown lines or reticulations. Its disk, or body, is about 5 ft (1.5 m) long and the tail can be nearly three times this length. Its stinger is a single, large spine located a short distance from the tail base; some individuals have two spines. The body is almost diamond-shaped and the snout is broadly triangular with a pointed tip. Found in warm waters, mainly near the coast, reticulate whiprays are sometimes seen by divers, lying quietly in sandy patches between rocks.
OCEAN LIFE
pelvic fin
335
336
ORDER RAJIFORMES
Southern Stingray Dasyatis americana WIDTH (WINGSPAN)
61/2 ft (2 m) WEIGHT
Up to 300 lb (135 kg) DEPTH
0–180 ft (0–55 m) DISTRIBUTION
Western Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico,
Caribbean Sea
Stingrays are feared because their long tails are equipped with one or more daggerlike, venomous spines. The southern stingray has a single, serrated spine about midway along the tail and a flap of skin, also known as a finfold, on the underside of the tail. Its thick disk is dark gray on top and white underneath. This stingray spends most of the day lying buried in the sand at the bottom of shallow lagoons and off beaches. At night, the ray feeds by excavating holes in the sand and crunching up bivalve mollusks,
crustaceans, and worms. Because its eyes are on top of its head, it cannot see its prey but uses smell and electroreceptors to detect it. While it is buried, its spiracles—through which it draws in water for breathing—are visible as a pair of holes in the sand. People are often stung when they inadvertently step on southern stingrays; the stinging spine is sharp enough to cause a serious wound and the venom causes severe pain. The pain can be reduced by immersing the wound in hot water.
ORDER RAJIFORMES
ORDER RAJIFORMES
Atlantic Torpedo
Blue-spotted Stingray
Torpedo nobiliana
Taeniura lymma
Nearly 61/2 ft (2 m) including tail
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Up to 61/2 ft (2 m) including tail
LENGTH
Up to 200 lb
(90 kg) DEPTH
WEIGHT
To 2,600 ft
DISTRIBUTION
Shallow water to about 65 ft (20 m)
DEPTH
Atlantic, Mediterranean
Electric rays use special organs to produce electricity, which they discharge to stun their prey or attack predators. The Atlantic torpedo is the largest electric ray and can produce a shock of up to 220 volts—enough to stun a person. It can easily be recognized by its circular, disklike body and short, thick tail ending in a large, paddle-shaped fin. It is a uniform dark brown or black on the back and white underneath. The electric organs are in the ray’s wings, or pectoral fins, and like a battery, they can store electricity. When hunting, the Atlantic torpedo wraps its wings around its prey before stunning it.
DISTRIBUTION
Indian Ocean, western Pacific,
Red Sea
ORDER RAJIFORMES
Round Stingray Urolophus halleri LENGTH
23 in (58 cm) including tail WEIGHT
3 lb (1.4 kg) DEPTH
0–300 ft (0–90 m) DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Up to 65 lb
(30 kg)
(800 m)
Eastern Pacific
As its name suggests, the round stingray has an almost circular disk. This species and its relatives the “stingarees” have shorter tails than other stingrays and the tail ends in a leaf-shaped fin. The round stingray varies in color from pale to dark brown and can be either plain or mottled with darker spots and reticulations. These rays are most often seen in summer, when they
move inshore into inlets and bays to forage for invertebrates among seagrass and bask in the warm-water shallows. Females arrive in the shallows around June ready to breed, and the males, who are already there, swim along the shoreline looking for suitable mates. Sexually mature females are reported to give off an electrical field that the males can sense. Females give birth about three months after mating to about six live young. The juveniles stay inshore, where there are fewer predators, until they mature. When out foraging, they do not stray too far, remaining within an area of about 1 square mile (2.5 square km). Predators of the round stingray include the northern elephant seal and the black sea bass. They are also likely to be hunted by large carnivorous fish such as sharks. The round stingray’s sting is painful and can cause minor injuries.
Since it is active in the daytime, divers often see this beautifully colored ray on coral reefs. It is most often spotted lying on sandy patches under coral heads and rocks. Often, its blue-striped tail sticks out and gives away its hiding place. Large, bright blue spots cover the disk, which is greenish brown. Like all stingrays, it has a venomous spine on its tail. As the tide rises, these rays move in groups into shallow water to hunt for invertebrates such as mollusks, crabs, shrimp, and worms.
337
HUMAN IMPACT
34).'2!9#)49 3OUTHERNSTINGRAYSARENOT AGGRESSIVETOWARDHUMANSAND ONLYSTINGIFSTEPPEDON4HEIR STINGSAREUSEDASDEFENSEAGAINST SHARKS THEIRNATURALPREDATOR !TASITEIN'RAND#AYMANIN THE#ARIBBEAN CALLEDª3TINGRAY #ITY «THEYHAVEBECOMEUSED TOHUMANSANDCANBEHAND FED 6ISITORSWADE SWIM ANDDIVE AMONGTHESEGRACEFULCREATURES
ORDER RAJIFORMES
Manta Ray Manta birostris WIDTH (WINGSPAN)
Up
to 26 ft (8 m) Up to 4,000 lb (1.8 metric tons)
WEIGHT
0–80 ft (0–24 m); usually near surface
DEPTH
Surface tropical waters worldwide, sometimes warm temperate areas
DISTRIBUTION
Divers often describe the experience of swimming beneath a manta ray as like being overtaken by a huge flying saucer. This ray is the biggest in the world, but like the biggest shark, the whale shark, it is a harmless consumer of plankton and small fish. When feeding, it swims along with its cavernous mouth wide open, beating ORDER RAJIFORMES
Spotted Eagle Ray Aetobatus narinari WIDTH (WINGSPAN)
Up to 10 ft (3 m) WEIGHT
Up to 500 lb (230 kg) DEPTH
Tropical waters worldwide
Often solitary, spotted eagle rays also move around in huge shoals of at least a hundred individuals in open waters—a truly spectacular site when silhouetted against a sunlit surface. Unlike most other rays, the spotted eagle ray is a very active swimmer.
OCEAN LIFE
3–260 ft (1–80 m) DISTRIBUTION
Most of its swimming time is spent in open water, although it is also commonly seen inshore. It appears to “fly” through the water as it moves its pointed “wings”—enlarged pectoral fins—gracefully up and down. Besides the beautiful patterning of spots on its dorsal surface, another distinctive feature of the spotted eagle ray is its head, which ends in a flattened, slightly upturned snout that resembles a duck’s bill. It has a long, thin whiplike tail with a venomous spine near the base. These rays are very agile and can twist and turn to escape predatory sharks. Sometimes, small groups splash around at the surface, making spectacular leaps out of the water. Why they do this is not clear, but it may be to help dislodge parasites.
its huge triangular wings slowly up and down. On either side of the mouth, which is at the front of the head instead of on the underside as in other rays, are two long lobes, called cephalic horns, that funnel plankton into the mouth. These are the origin of its other name of devil ray. A short, sticklike tail trails behind. On coral reefs, manta rays tend to congregate over high points where currents bring plankton up to them. Small fish called remoras often travel attached to these giants. Despite their huge size, these ovoviviparous rays can leap clear of the water, occasionally giving birth to their young as they do so. The manta ray is also sociable with divers in some sites, and has been known to “dance” with them.
338
animal life
BONY FISHES BONY FISHES EXCEED ALL OTHER VERTEBRATE classes both in number of living species and in their abundance. They have KINGDOM Animalia evolved into myriad shapes and sizes, suiting every aquatic PHYLUM Ch ordata lifestyle and habitat and range from the shore to the deepest SUPERCLASS Osteichthyes depths and from polar seas to hot deep-sea vents. Bony fishes ORDERS 47 have an internal skeleton of bone, although that of a few SPECIES More than 28,000 primitive groups is part cartilage. The bony skeleton supports flexible fins that allow the fish to move with far greater precision than do the stiff fins of cartilaginous fishes. About one-third of bony fishes live only in fresh water, while the remainder lives in the oceans or migrates between the two habitats.
HUMAN IMPACT
DOMAIN Eucarya
Like other vertebrate animals, bony fishes have a skull, backbone, and ribs, but the skeleton also extends out into the fins as a series of flexible rays. Bony fishes, unlike sharks, can use their paired pectoral and pelvic fins for maneuvering, braking, and even swimming backward. Spiny-rayed fishes, a group that includes most bony fishes, also have sharp spines in the front portion of their dorsal, anal, and pelvic fins. A bony flap called the operculum covers the gills of bony fishes. It SWIMMING can be opened to regulate the flow of water in The sideways force and backward force exerted when a fish moves its through the mouth and out over the gills. A tail from side to side results in a covering of overlapping, flexible scales made thrust at an angle between the two. of thin bone protects most bony fishes. Some The resultant thrusts on left and right primitive bony fishes, such as sturgeon, are produce a net backward thrust and armored with thick, inflexible scales or plates. so the fish is propelled forward.
SALMON FARM
Salmon farms such as this one in Tasmania are a common sight in temperate seas. However, pesticides applied to kill sea-lice are causing concerns, as is the breeding of escaped salmon with wild fish, polluting the wild gene pool.
movement of tail sideways force
BONY SKELETON
Flexible rays and hard spines support all the fins in bony fish, such as this cod. The fins connect to spines extending from the vertebrae. The fish can precisely adjust the position of each fin.
first dorsal fin vertebrae linked into a flexible vertebral column spine extends from vertebra to fin second dorsal fin
skull
third dorsal fin
orbit (eye socket)
rib pectoral fin bony gill covering (operculum)
first anal fin
second anal fin
pelvic fin
esophagus gill filaments
tail (caudal) fin surface concealed under adjacent scale
oral valve
annual growth ring
mouth
exposed surface
exposed surfaces overlap to create smooth covering
direction of water movement
OCEAN LIFE
Most of the world’s fish stocks are currently fished at unsustainable levels. Cod, turbot, and salmon are now often farmed instead of wild-caught. On a large scale, this might relieve pressure on wild stocks. However, most farmed species consume feed prepared from other wild-caught fish.
forward movement
ANATOMY
hinged jaw
&)3(&!2-).'
gill arch, attachment point for filaments
GILLS, VIEWED FROM ABOVE
SCALES
As water passes over the gill filaments, gases are exchanged. Oxygen passes into the blood and carbon dioxide passes out into the water. Within the filaments, the blood flows in reverse relative to the water outside, so the concentration of gases in the fluids is opposed, which speeds the gases’ transfer.
Bony fishes can be aged by their scales. Slow winter growth produces dark rings on the scales, so each dark ring indicates one year of life. The system works best for temperate-water fish such as cod.
resultant thrust backward force
bony fishes gas gland
intestine
rete mirabile
dorsal aorta swim bladder
SWIM-BLADDER FUNCTION
A bony fish regulates its buoyancy by secreting gas, usually oxygen, from a gas gland into its swim bladder. The gland is supplied with blood (the source of the gas) by a network of capillaries called a rete mirabile.
BUOYANCY
339
brightly colored
second dorsal fin Most bony fishes have a gas-filled swim bladder that allows them to adjust their buoyancy, enabling them to hover in midwater and keep from sinking. This is especially useful to fish that spend their lives in midwater. Many bottom-living fish, such as flatfish, have a poorly developed swim bladder or none at all. To compensate for pressure changes as a fish swims toward or away from the surface, it regulates the amount of gas in the swim bladder, usually by secreting gas into it through a gland. In some primitive fish, such as the herring, the swim bladder is connected to the gut and is filled when the fish gulps air at the surface. Many bony fishes can vibrate the swim bladder with special muscles to anal fin produce sounds. Cartilaginous fishes do not have a swim bladder. They gain MULTIPURPOSE FINS buoyancy to some extent with their large, oil-filled livers and lightweight Triggerfish swim by undulating their bones. However, cartilaginous fishes must also use their large pectoral fins second dorsal and anal fins, maintaining and tail to give them lift. Bony fishes with a swim bladder have been freed buoyancy with their swim bladder. Bright from this necessity and, in many species, the fins have developed into fins may also function as visual signals versatile appendages used for courtship, feeding, attack, or defense. in communication, including courtship.
FLEXIBLE APPENDAGES
A frogfish displays one of the many functions of bony fish fins. Since they are not required to give the fish lift, the warty frogfish’s paired fins have evolved into flexible appendages with which it clambers over the sea bed.
SENSES Bony fishes use vision, hearing, touch, taste, and smell.Vision is most important in well-lit habitats. Coral reef fish have good color vision, and they use colors and patterns for recognition, warning, deception, and courtship. Color receptors in the eyes do not operate well in dim light. Nocturnal fish and fish living in the twilight zone (see p.170) have large, sensitive eyes, but little sensitivity to different colors. Dark-zone fish often have only tiny eyes, but have a sharp sense of smell and use pheromones for long-distance communication. Sound also carries well underwater (see p.39) and some fish produce intense sounds with their swim bladder. Bony fishes move in unison in shoals with the help of their lateral-line sensory system, for which there is no equivalent in other vertebrates. Sense organs arranged in a canal along the head and sides of each fish pick up water movements created by the other fish. The wide field of view, due to having eyes set on the sides of the head, also helps precision shoaling. SIGNALLING COLORS
Color is effective in communication on welllit coral reefs. The gaudiness of the Mandarin Fish may warn predators that it is unpalatable.
LATERAL LINE
OCEAN LIFE
The lateral-line system can be seen in many bony fishes, such as the pollack shown here, as a white line along the sides of the fish. The shape of the line is a useful identification feature.
340
animal life
REPRODUCTION The majority of bony fish, when mature, simply shed their eggs and sperm directly into the sea, where fertilization takes place. The eggs develop and the larvae hatch while drifting on ocean currents. Death rates of eggs and larvae are high, so many eggs are laid—up to 100 million by the giant ocean sunfish. Once the larvae have grown to juvenile fish, they often congregate in nursery grounds in sheltered estuaries and bays. In contrast to most oceanic fish, many coastal bottom-living species are able to protect their offspring, so they lay fewer, larger eggs, often hiding them or caring for them until they hatch. Some have evolved elaborate forms of care, such as mouth brooding.
MOUTH BROODING
When a female jawfish has laid her eggs, the male collects them into his mouth to keep them safe. He will not feed until the eggs hatch and the fry disperse.
SEX CHANGE IN THE CUCKOO WRASSE
Like most wrasse, cuckoo wrasse have a complex reproductive pattern featuring sex change. The majority of eggs develop first into pink females.
1
Some older females develop the blue-and-orange pattern of males and change sex after about seven years of age. Others remain female.
2
At the next spawning season, a sexchanged male acquires vibrant colors and courts all females in his territory, fertilizing their eggs (see p.369).
3
HUNTING AND PROTECTION
OCEAN LIFE
All fish must eat and in doing so may expose themselves to the risk of being eaten if they come out into the open to forage. Their ultimate aim is to survive long enough to reproduce successfully and so pass on their genes to the next generation. Bony fish have evolved many ingenious methods for catching prey and defending themselves against predators. Camouflage is an effective strategy and can serve to hide a fish, both from its predators and from its prey. Color patterns can also deceive, and butterflyfish use false eye patterns to fool predators into lunging for their tail end. In the CAMOUFLAGE crowded environment of a coral reef, many Scorpionfish employ color, small fish protect themselves with spines. Filefish shape, and behavior in a combined camouflage erect a dorsal spine and lock it into position, strategy. Experts at keeping thereby preventing larger fish from swallowing still, they can strike with lightning speed if a small fish them. Out in the surface waters of the open ocean, there is nowhere to hide, and many strays within reach. small fish live in shoals for safety. Predators find it difficult to pick out a target as the shoal moves and swirls. Although the shoal is conspicuous, it is safer for each individual to join than to swim alone.
SHOALING
Even predatory fish need protection from larger predators, especially when young. Barracuda juveniles live in shoals during the day, while most adults hunt alone.
SHADOW-HUNTING
Trumpetfish often shadow predatory fish when they hunt, since the larger fish will often flush out suitable prey. This trumpetfish has chosen to swim with a Nassau grouper similar in color to itself.
bony fishes
341
BONY FISHES CLASSIFICATION Bony fish comprise the ray-finned fishes (subclass Actinopterygii), and the lobe-finned fishes (subclass Sarcopterygii), including the lungfishes (freshwater) and the coelacanths, but also giving rise to tetrapods (see cladogram, p.206). Below are 30 marine orders of both subclasses. COELACANTHS Order Coelacanthiformes
CATFISH Order Siluriformes
2 species
2,867 species
One family—the only marine lobe-finned fish. Fins arise from fleshy, limblike lobes, vertebral column not fully formed.
Only two marine families out of 33. Long body, up to four pairs of barbels around mouth. Sharp, sometimes venomous spine in front of dorsal and pectoral fins. Most with adipose fin.
STURGEONS AND PADDLEFISH Order Acipenseriformes 25 species
SMELTS Order Osmeriformes
Only sturgeon family is marine. Skeleton part bone, part cartilage. Sturgeons have asymmetrical tail and underslung mouth.
227 species
TARPONS AND TENPOUNDERS Order Elopiformes
SALMONS Order Salmoniformes
7 species
66 species
Two families, mostly marine. Spindle-shaped, silvery fish, one dorsal fin, forked tail. Unique bones in throat (gular plates). Swim bladder can be used as lung. Transparent larvae.
One family with marine, anadromous, and freshwater members. Powerful, spindle-shaped fish, with large mouth and eyes. One fin plus adipose fin on back. Small, rounded scales. Pelvic fins abdominal.
BONEFISH Order Albuliformes 5 species
One family, mostly marine. Similar to tarpons, but smaller and very bony, with complex structural differences.
Thirteen families, mostly marine or anadromous. Small, slim relations of salmon.
COD FISH Order Gadiformes
DORIES AND ALLIES Order Zeiformes
475 species
42 species
Ten families, mostly marine and benthic. Most with two or three spineless dorsal fins and a chin barbel. Grenadiers have long, thin tails.
Six families, all marine. Deep-bodied but thin fish; large, spiny head and protrusile jaws. Long dorsal and anal fins with spines at front.
TOADFISH Order Batrachoidiformes 69 species
One family, mostly marine, coastal, and benthic. Broad, flat head, wide mouth, eyes on top; one short, spiny and one long, soft dorsal fin. CUSK EELS Order Ophidiiformes 354 species
Five families, mostly marine. Eel-like fish with long dorsal and anal fin that may join with tail fin. Thin pelvic fins. ANGLERFISH, ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
STICKLEBACKS AND SEAMOTHS Order Gasterosteiformes 16 species
Five families, mostly freshwater. Long, thin, stiff with bony scutes along sides, separate spines on back. Seamoths aberrant, flattened with enlarged pectoral fins. PIPEFISH AND SEAHORSES Order Syngnathiformes 240 species
Five families, marine and freshwater. Long body encased in armor of bony plates. Small mouth at end of tubular snout. SCORPIONFISH AND FLATHEADS Order Scorpaeniformes 1,326 species
Thirty-five families, mostly marine. Mainly shallow water, benthic. Large, spiny head, most with spiny dorsal fins, often venomous. Unique bony strut across cheek.
LIGHTFISH AND DRAGONFISH Order Stomiiformes 391 species
Four abundant, deep-ocean families. Mostly elongate predators with large teeth and photophores. Significant part of ocean’s fishes.
PERCHLIKE FISH Order Perciformes About 9,500 species
MORAY EEL, ORDER ANGUILLIFORMES
EELS Order Anguilliformes 737 species
Marine and freshwater, 15 families. Body long and thin, no scales or pelvic fins, one long fin along back, tail, and belly. SWALLOWERS AND GULPERS Order Saccopharyngiformes 28 species
Four families of highly aberrant deep-sea, eel-like fish with huge, loose jaws; no tail fin, pelvic fins, scales, ribs, or swim bladder.
GRINNERS Order Aulopiformes
ANGLERFISH Order Lophiiformes
228 species
300 species
Thirteen families, all marine. Diverse, slim coastal and deep-sea fish. Large mouth with many small teeth. Pelvic fins abdominal, one fin plus adipose fin on back, no fin spines.
Eighteen families, all marine. Large, flattened or rounded head with cavernous mouth and fishing lure on top. Shallow-water species benthic; deep-water species pelagic.
LANTERNFISH Order Myctophiformes
CLINGFISH Order Gobiesociformes
241 species
120 species
Two deep-ocean, widely distributed, abundant families. Small, slim fish, large eyes and mouth. One fin plus adipose fin on back. Many photophores. Daily vertical migration. VELIFERS, TUBE-EYES, AND RIBBONFISH Order Lampriformes 18 species
Seven families, all marine. Colorful, bright, often huge, open-water fish with crimson fins. Many have long rays from dorsal fin.
HERRINGS Order Clupeiformes
NEEDLEFISH Order Beloniformes 186 species
TURBOT, ORDER PLEURONECTIFORMES
Five families, marine and freshwater. Mostly long, thin fish with jaws extended as beaks. Flying fish have large pectoral and pelvic fins.
FLATFISH Order Pleuronectiformes
SILVERSIDES Order Antheriniformes
SQUIRRELFISH AND RELATIVES Order Beryciformes
MILKFISH Order Gonorynchiformes
121 species
27 species HERRING, ORDER CLUPEIFORMES
Seven families, all marine. Deep-bodied, big eyes (except deep-water), dorsal fin spiny at front, forked tail, large scales. Most nocturnal.
572 species
Eleven families, mostly marine. Lie on seabed. Body flattened from side to side, both eyes on upper side. Start life as normal, symmetrical fish larvae in plankton. PUFFERS AND FILEFISH Order Tetraodontiformes 353 species
Nine families, marine and freshwater. Very diverse group ranges from triggerfish to ocean sunfish. Small mouth with few large teeth or tooth plates. Scales usually modified as plates, spines, or shields.
OCEAN LIFE
Eight families, marine and freshwater. Small, slim, silvery fish; most with two dorsal fins, often in large shoals.
Six families, mostly marine. Silvery body with keeled belly and forked tail. Anchovies and herring comprise two biggest families.
Four families, only milkfish and beaked salmon marine. Pelvic fins set far back.
One family, mostly marine. Small, shallowwater, benthic fish; pelvic fins forming sucker-disk. Eyes set high; single dorsal fin.
312 species
397 species
156 families, marine and freshwater. Largest and most diverse vertebrate order. Most have both spines and soft rays in dorsal and anal fins. Pelvic fins close to pectorals and with one spine. Perciform classification subject to change.
342
animal life ORDER COELACANTHIFORMES
Coelacanth Latimeria chalumnae LENGTH
Up to 6 ft (2 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 210 lb
(95 kg) 490–2,300 ft (150–700 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Western Indian Ocean
When it was first discovered in 1938, the coelacanth was nicknamed “old four legs” because its pectoral fins had strange, fleshy, limblike bases. The only other primitive group to have a similar arrangement are the freshwater lungfish. It is from fish like these that the first four-legged land animals are thought to have developed. This coelacanth’s tail has an extra small
ORDER ACIPENSERIFORMES
European Sturgeon Acipenser sturio LENGTH
11 ft (3.5 m)
Up to 880 lb (400 kg)
WEIGHT
13–295 ft (4–90 m)
DEPTH
Coastal waters of northeastern Atlantic, Mediterranean, and Black Sea
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
,IKEMOSTSTURGEON THISSPECIES SWIMSFROMTHESEAINTOLARGERIVERS TOSPAWNINGRAVELLYAREASThese prehistoric-looking fish belong to a primitive group in which only the skull and some fin supports are made of bone. The rest of the skeleton consists mainly of cartilage. Instead of scales, five rows of distinctive bony plates, or scutes, run along the body. Two pairs of barbels hang down from flattened, bony head barbels
lobe in the middle, and its body is covered in heavy scales, which are made up of four layers of bone and a hard mineral material. In life, these shimmer an iridescent blue with white flecks. Coelacanths live in deep water on steep, rocky reefs and, so far, have been found at only a few sites off the south and east coasts of Africa and the west coast of Madagascar. By using small submersibles to study these fish, scientists have discovered that they retreat into caves at night. When out searching for food, they drift along in ocean currents or scull slowly with their fins. Having located a fish or squid, the coelacanth then uses its powerful tail to propel itself forward so that it can seize its prey. The coelacanth is listed as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List of Endangered Species. International trade in this species is banned.
DISCOVERY
ORDER COELACANTHIFORMES
&/33),%6)$%.#% #OELACANTHSWERETHOUGHTTOHAVE BECOMEEXTINCTABOUTMILLION YEARSAGO7HENALIVECOELACANTH WASCAUGHTIN COMPARINGIT WITHFOSSILCOELACANTHSENABLED SCIENTISTSTOCONFIRMITSIDENTITY !LIVINGSPECIMENOFAFOSSIL SPECIESHADBEENFOUND
Indonesian Coelacanth Latimeria menadoensis LENGTH
Up to 41/2 ft
(1.4 m) WEIGHT
Up to 200 lb
(90 kg) 490–655 ft (150–200 m)
DEPTH
Celebes Sea, north of Sulawesi, in the western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
FOSSIL COELACANTH
Fossil specimens of coelacanths have features almost identical to present-day coelacanths, including the unique three-lobed tail.
When the Indonesian coelacanth was discovered in 1998, it was at first thought to be the same species as the one found in African waters (see left). The two are indeed very similar, but molecular studies suggest that they are different species. An entire ocean separates them, and because coelacanths are slow swimmers, the populations are not thought to mix. The Indonesian coelacanth has the same white markings and distinctive gold flecks as the African species, but it is brown rather than bluish. As yet, little is known of its life history, but because it is so physically similar to the African species, it probably has the same behavior and could therefore be endangered by fishing.
HUMAN IMPACT
#!6)!2"!. Once common, the European sturgeon is now extremely rare due to overfishing and poaching, and because locks and POLLUTED ESTUARIESHAVEMADEMANYRIVERS UNSUITABLEFORSPAWNING&EW ACTIVESPAWNINGSITESREMAIN4HIS STURGEONISCRITICALLYENDANGERED ANDINTERNATIONALTRADEIN THEFISHITSELFANDANY PRODUCTSFROMIT INCLUDINGCAVIAR SALTEDROE HASBEEN BANNED
ORDER ACIPENSERIFORMES
Beluga Sturgeon Huso huso LENGTH
the pointed snout and are used to search out bottom-living invertebrates. The European sturgeon can live for up to 100 years. bony scute
16 ft (5 m)
Up to 4,400 lb (2,000 kg)
WEIGHT
230–590 ft (70–180 m)
DEPTH
Northern Mediterranean, Black Sea, Caspian Sea, and associated rivers
DISTRIBUTION
The beluga is both the largest species of sturgeon and the largest European fish to enter fresh water. Stouter and heavier than the European sturgeon (see left), it has a more triangular snout with a very wide mouth. Four long barbels hang from the underside of the snout, reaching almost to the mouth. Like all sturgeon, the beluga has an asymmetrical, sharklike tail with the backbone extending into the large upper lobe. Reputed to be the most expensive fish in the world, it also produces the most prized caviar, with large fish containing 220–440 lb (100–200 kg). The beluga sturgeon is endangered due to poaching and damming of its spawning rivers.
343
ORDER ELOPIFORMES
Tarpon Megalops atlanticus LENGTH
Up to 8 ft (2.5 m) WEIGHT
350 lb (160 kg) DEPTH
0–100 ft (0–30 m) Coastal waters of western and eastern Atlantic DISTRIBUTION
ORDER ELOPIFORMES
Ladyfish
With its large scales and intensely silvery body, the tarpon resembles an oversized herring but, in fact, is closely related to the eels. It has an upturned mouth, and the base of the single dorsal fin is drawn out into a long filament, although this is not always easy to see. Living close inshore, this fish often enters estuaries, lagoons, and rivers. If it enters stagnant water, it surfaces and gulps air, which passes from the esophagus into its swim bladder; this then acts like a lung.
Tarpon spawn mostly in open water at sea. A large female can produce over 12 million eggs, but larval and juvenile mortality is high. The larvae, which are thin and transparent and very like eel larvae except that they have forked tails, drift inshore into estuarine nursery grounds. Tarpon larvae are also found in pools and lakes that become temporarily cut off from the sea. Fishermen get to know the areas where tarpon shoals can regularly be seen from year to year, hunting for
other shoaling fish such as sardines, anchovies, and mullet. They will also eat some bottom-living invertebrates such as crabs. Considered an excellent game fish in US and Caribbean waters, tarpon make spectacular leaps when hooked. They are also fished commercially and, in spite of being rather bony, are considered delicious. Tarpon can live for 55 years and are often displayed in public aquariums. Their large scales are sometimes used in ornamental work.
ORDER ALBULIFORMES
Bonefish
Elops saurus
Albula vulpes LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 3 ft (1 m)
Up to 3 ft (1 m)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
22 lb (10 kg)
22 lb (10 kg)
DEPTH
DEPTH
0–165 ft (0–50 m)
0–280 ft (0–85 m)
Coastal waters of western Atlantic and Caribbean Sea
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and subtropical coastal waters of western and eastern Atlantic
The ladyfish has a single dorsal fin in the middle of its back and a tail that is deeply forked. Shoals of this slim, silvery blue fish can be found close to the shore and will skip along the surface if alarmed by a boat’s engine noise. The adult fish move offshore to spawn in open water, and the young larvae, which resemble eel larvae, eventually drift back into sheltered bays and lagoons. Also known as the ten-pounder, the ladyfish is considered a good game fish and will leap out of the water when hooked. It is fished commercially, but it is not a very high-quality food fish and so is often used for bait.
As its common name suggests, this fish is extremely bony. It is streamlined and silvery, with dark markings on its back, a single dorsal fin, and a blunt snout extending over the mouth. Bonefish have been found in tropical and subtropical waters of the Pacific Ocean, but it is not yet known if these populations are a different species from those found in the eastern and western Atlantic. Although bonefish do not make good eating, they are one of the world’s most important game fish. Fishermen enjoy stalking them through the shallows in bays and estuaries as they often swim at the surface with the dorsal fin showing.
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
344
animal life ORDER ANGUILLIFORMES
ORDER ANGUILLIFORMES
European Eel
Chain Moray Eel
Anguilla anguilla
Echidna catenata LENGTH
Up to 41/4 ft
LENGTH
14 lb (6.6 kg)
WEIGHT
Up to 51/2 ft (1.7 m)
(1.3 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded
0–2,300 ft (0–700 m)
DEPTH
DEPTH
0–40 ft (0–12 m) Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic, fresh water inland
DISTRIBUTION
Living most of its life in fresh water, the European eel swims thousands of miles down to the sea and across the Atlantic Ocean to the Sargasso Sea to spawn. After spawning in deep water, the eels die, leaving the eggs to hatch into transparent, leaflike (leptocephalus) larvae. Over the next year or so, the larvae drift back to the coasts of Europe. Nearing the coast, they change shape and become tiny transparent eels, or elvers, that swim and wriggle their way up rivers into fresh water. The European eel is becoming increasingly scarce due to pressure on stocks caused by fishing and the damming of rivers.
The chain moray eel is one of very few marine eels that can survive for some time out of water, and it will forage over wet rocks for up to 30 minutes at a time during low tide. As long as it remains wet, it can absorb some oxygen through its skin. The chain moray eel is easily recognized by its short, blunt snout and chainlike yellow markings. Some of its teeth are broad and molarlike and help it to cope with heavily armored prey such as crabs. It can swallow small crabs whole, but breaks up bigger ones first by twisting, tugging, and thrashing around. The chain moray eel is a member of a large family of moray eels (Muraenidae) that live on reefs throughout the tropics. Most species of moray eels are nocturnal, but the chain moray eel is usually active during the day.
DISTRIBUTION
6%23!4),%(5.4%2 -OSTSPECIESOFMORAYEELSSPEND THEDAYINHOLESINAREEFWITHJUST THEIRHEADSSTICKINGOUT EMERGING ATDUSKTOHUNT4HEYRELYONTHEIR EXCELLENTSENSEOFSMELLTOFINDFISH RESTINGBETWEENCORALSANDROCKS 5NUSUALLY THECHAINMORAYEEL ALSOHUNTSOVERROCKYSHORESAND
Tropical reefs of western and central
Atlantic
short, blunt snout
broad teeth
ORDER ANGUILLIFORMES
ORDER ANGUILLIFORMES
Slender Snipe Eel
Ribbon Eel
Nemichthys scolopaceus
Rhinomuraena quaesita LENGTH
REEFSATLOWTIDEDURINGTHEDAY )TUSESITSSHARPEYESIGHTTOSEARCH FORFISHANDCRUSTACEANSINCREVICES ANDHOLESAND WHENITHASLOCATED ITSPREY ITSTRIKES RATHERLIKEA SNAKE/THERMORAYEELSWILL SOMETIMESSTRIKEATPASSINGPREY FROMTHEIRHOLESDURINGTHEDAY
Up to 41/4 ft
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Not recorded
WEIGHT DEPTH
Tropical reefs of Indian and Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Temperate and tropical seas
oceans
worldwide
Unlike most other eels, ribbon eels change color and sex during their life. Juveniles are nearly black with a yellow dorsal fin. As they mature, the black becomes bright blue and the snout and lower jaw turn yellow. This is the male color stage. When they reach a body length of about 41/4 ft (1.3 m), the males turn yellow and become fully functional females, which lay eggs. Ribbon eels live on coral reefs, mostly hiding in crevices. They have leaflike nostril flaps, which sense vibrations in the water.
This long, slender, deep-sea eel has remarkable jaws, shaped like a bird’s bill, with the ends turned out so that they can never fully close. It spends its life drifting in midwater, catching small crustaceans to eat. When the males mature and are ready to spawn, their jaws shorten, they lose all their teeth, and their front nostrils grow into large tubes. This probably enhances their sense of smell, helping them to find mature females. Little else is known of the slender snipe eel’s lifestyle, as it is rarely caught.
ORDER ANGUILLIFORMES
Conger Eel Conger conger LENGTH
Up to 10 ft (3 m) WEIGHT
Up to 240 lb (110 kg) DEPTH
1,600 ft (0–500 m)
OCEAN LIFE
Not recorded
300–6,600 ft (90–2,000 m)
3–200 ft (1–60 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Up to 41/4 ft
(1.3 m)
(1.3 m)
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
The large, gray head of a conger eel sticking out of a hole in a shipwreck is a familiar sight to many divers. Like their relatives the moray eels, conger eels hide in holes and crevices in rocky reefs during the day, only emerging at night to hunt for fish,
crustaceans, and cuttlefish. This snakelike fish has a powerful body with smooth skin, no scales, and a pointed tail. A single dorsal fin runs along the back, starting a short distance behind the head, continuing around the tail, and ending halfway along the belly. In the summer, adult conger eels migrate into deep water in the Mediterranean and Atlantic to spawn and then die. The female lays 3–8 million eggs, which hatch into long, thin larvae that slowly drift back inshore, where they grow into juvenile eels. They take 5–15 years to reach sexual maturity. The conger eel is a good food fish and is caught in large numbers by anglers, but it sometimes manages to use its strength to escape with the bait.
bony fishes ORDER ANGUILLIFORMES
Spotted Garden Eel Heteroconger hassi LENGTH
Up to 16 in (40 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
23–150 ft (7–45 m) Red Sea and tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific DISTRIBUTION
These eels spend their lives swaying gracefully to and fro with their heads up in the water and their tails in their sandy burrows. Several hundred fish live together in a colony, or “garden,” looking like evenly spaced plants blowing in the breeze. Garden eels are much slimmer than their close relatives, the conger eels. They are only about 1/2 in (14 mm) in diameter and have very small pectoral fins. The spotted garden eel usually has two large dark spots behind the head as well as many tiny ones all over the
body. It has an upturned mouth that is designed to pick tiny planktonic animals from the water as the current flows by. Colonies of these eels occur only on sandy slopes that are exposed to currents but sheltered from waves. When danger threatens, the eels sink back down into their burrows, using their tails as an anchor until only their small heads and eyes are visible. They are very difficult to photograph
hard, pointed tail tip
Banded Snake Eel Myrichthys colubrinus LENGTH
Up to 38 in (97 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
Shallow water Tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific DISTRIBUTION
tiny eyes
wide mouth
ORDER SACCOPHARYNGIFORMES
Gulper Eel Saccopharynx lavenbergi LENGTH
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded 6,600–9,800 ft (2,000–3,000 m)
DEPTH
Deep waters of eastern Pacific, from California to Peru
DISTRIBUTION
The gulper eel is best known for its ability to swallow prey as large as itself. This fish has a small head and tiny eyes but enormous jaws. Its mouth and throat can be hugely distended to engulf its prey and the teeth can be depressed backward. Its stomach can be similarly extended to accommodate its gargantuan meals. The body ends in a luminous organ on a long, whiplike tail. This feature may be used as a lure or a decoy; this has yet to be confirmed, since no one has been able to observe these deep-sea fish in the wild. The gulper eel has planktonic eggs that develop into long, thin larvae, like those of its shallow-water relatives, and it probably dies after spawning.
OCEAN LIFE
Cleverly disguised to look like the venomous yellow-lipped sea krait, the banded snake eel is avoided by most predators. This allows it to hunt safely over sand flats and seagrass beds near coral reefs for small fish and crustaceans. Most individuals of this species are banded with broad black and white bands, but in some areas these eels have dark blotches between the bands. This color variant may
eventually be identified as a different species. The banded snake eel has a pointed head with a pair of large tubular nostrils on the upper jaw that point downwards. This arrangement gives the fish an excellent sense of smell that allows it to seek out prey hidden beneath the sand surface. With no fins except for very small pectoral fins, the banded snake eel swims by undulating its long body. When not hunting, it buries itself in the sand using the hard, pointed tip of its tail to burrow in tail-first. These fish are most active by night. They tend to remain in their burrows during the day and so are not often seen by divers. The banded snake eel belongs to a large family (Ophichthidae) which includes around 250 snake and worm eels, most of which burrow into sand and mud. All the members of this family have flattened transparent, leaflike (leptocephalus) larvae.
underwater because they are able to detect the vibrations from a scuba diver’s air bubbles and will disappear when they are approached. Spotted garden eels stay in their burrows even when spawning. Neighboring males and females reach across and entwine their bodies before releasing eggs and sperm. Mixed colonies of spotted and whitespotted garden eels sometimes occur.
long, slender tail
distinctive banded markings
ORDER ANGUILLIFORMES
345
346 ORDER CLUPEIFORMES
Atlantic Herring Clupea harengus LENGTH
Up to 18 in (45 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 21/4 lb (1 kg) DEPTH
0–650 ft (0–200 m) DISTRIBUTION
North Atlantic, North Sea, and
Baltic Sea
Until the middle of the 20th century, the Atlantic herring was the mainstay of many fishing communities bordering the North Sea and north
ORDER CLUPEIFORMES
Peruvian Anchoveta Engraulis ringens LENGTH
Up to 8 in (20 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 1 oz (25 g) DEPTH
10–260 ft (3–80 m) West coast of South America and southeastern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
The distribution of this tiny, silvery relative of the herring depends on the yearly extent of the Peruvian Current. This cold, deep current comes to the surface along the west coast of South America, bringing rich supplies of nutrients with it. Enormous shoals of anchoveta feed on the plankton blooms triggered by the increase in nutrients. The fish shoal within about 50 miles (80 km) of the coast, and many local people depend on them, as do many birds, including pelicans.
ORDER CLUPEIFORMES
South American Pilchard Sardinops sagax LENGTH
Up to 16 in (40 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 171/2 oz (485 g) DEPTH
0–650 ft (0–200 m) West coast of South America and southeastern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Enormous shoals of these fish, made up of millions of individuals, were once found, but excessive fishing has reduced their numbers greatly.
ORDER CLUPEIFORMES
Allis Shad Alosa alosa LENGTH
Up to 33 in (83 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 9 lb (4 kg) DEPTH
0–16 ft (0–5 m) Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean Sea
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
Pilchards are an important food fish and are also used to produce oil and fish meal. The South American pilchard may, in fact, be the same species as the California pilchard, and, worldwide, all pilchard species are very similar. These silvery, medium-sized fish are blue-green on the back and have a series of black marks along the sides. The Allis shad is a silvery fish belonging to the herring family (Clupeidae) and is one of the few that enter fresh water. During April and May, mature adults migrate into rivers to spawn, swimming up to 500 miles (800 km) upstream. In some parts of its range, the species is known as the May fish. Its streamlined body is covered by large circular scales that form a keel under the belly, and it has a single dorsal fin. It is now very rare over much of its range.
ORDER GONORYNCHIFORMES
Milkfish Chanos chanos LENGTH
Up to 6 ft (1.8 m) WEIGHT
Up to 31 lb (14 kg) DEPTH
0–100 ft (0–30 m) Tropical and subtropical waters of Indian and Pacific oceans
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic. Along the East Anglian coast of Great Britain, the fish were known as silver darlings. In the 20th century, excessive fishing using new techniques led to a steep decline in stocks. Today, the stocks are managed, but they are still under pressure. The Atlantic herring feeds on plankton, coming to the surface at night after spending the day in deeper water. It lives in large shoals, and across its range the species is divided into distinct local races, which differ from each other in size and behavior. Each race has several traditional spawning grounds. The females produce up to 40,000 eggs each, which form a thick mat on the seabed. The milkfish is an elegant silvery fish with a streamlined body and a large, deeply forked tail. It is an important food fish in much of Southeast Asia and is extensively farmed. It feeds on plankton, soft algae, cyanobacteria, and small invertebrates. It is easy to keep in captivity as it is able to tolerate a wide range of salinity. Mature fish spawn in the sea, and the eggs and larvae drift inshore. Juveniles swim into estuaries and mangroves, where there are fewer predators, returning to the sea as they mature.
bony fishes
347
ORDER SILURIFORMES
Gafftopsail Sea Catfish Bagre marinus LENGTH
Up to 28 in (70 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 10 lb (4.5 kg) DEPTH
To 160 ft (50 m) Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea, and subtropical waters of western Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
The most conspicuous feature of this silvery catfish is the pair of very long mouth barbels that extend back almost to the end of the pectoral fins. It has another pair of short barbels under the chin. The first rays of the large dorsal fin and the pectoral fins are drawn out as long, flat filaments and these fins also have a venomous serrated spine. When threatened, this catfish erects its dorsal fin and spreads out its pectoral fins like the sails of a yacht. sail-like dorsal fin
ORDER SILURIFORMES
Striped Catfish Plotosus lineatus LENGTH
Up to 13 in (32 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded 3–200 ft (1–60 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION Red Sea and tropical waters in Indian and Pacific oceans
ORDER OSMERIFORMES
European Smelt Osmerus eperlanus LENGTH
18 in (45 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
To 160 ft (50 m) DISTRIBUTION Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Baltic Sea
The juveniles of this distinctive blackand-white striped catfish of the family Plotosidae stay together in dense, ballshaped shoals and are often seen by divers over coral reefs. Adults live on their own or in small groups, but are well protected by a venomous, serrated spine in front of the first dorsal fin and each of the pectoral fins. A sting from an adult striped catfish can be dangerous to humans and is very occasionally fatal. These fish hunt at night, using four pairs of sensory The European smelt is a small relation of salmon and trout and, like them, has a dorsal fin and an adipose, the latter of which is small and fatty. The name derives from the fact that, when fresh, this fish has a strong smell that is reminiscent of cucumber. Adults swim in shoals in inshore waters, hunting small crustaceans and fish. They migrate up rivers to spawn, and the young fish are common in sheltered estuaries such as the Wash in southeast England (see p.134).
ORDER OSMERIFORMES
Capelin Mallotus villosus LENGTH
Up to 10 in (25 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 14/5 oz (52 g) 0–1,000 ft (0–300 m) DISTRIBUTION
North Pacific, north Atlantic, and
Arctic Ocean
This small, silvery relative of salmon forms large shoals in cold and Arctic waters and is a vital food source for sea birds and marine mammals. The breeding success of some seabird
ORDER OSMERIFORMES
Barrel-eye Opisthoproctus soleatus LENGTH
Up to 4 in (10 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded 1,000–2,600 ft (300–800 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and subtropical waters
worldwide
colonies has been linked to the abundance of capelin, and this in turn depends on environmental factors and exploitation by fishing. It is a major food source for Inuit peoples. Capelin are slim fish, with an olive-green back fading into silvery white on the sides. Shoals of this fish swim along with their mouths open, straining out plankton, which is caught on their modified gills. While this is their main source of food, they also eat worms and small fish. In spring, the schools move inshore, the males arriving first and waiting for the females. The males develop a band of modified scales along their sides and use these to massage the female, stimulating her to lay her eggs in the sand.
deeply forked tail
broad pectoral fin
Many fish that live in the twilight zone (see p.174), including the barrel-eye, have large eyes to make full use of what little light is available. As well as being large, the eyes of this species are tubular and point upward. This arrangement probably helps the barrel-eye to stalk other fish from below. Looking up, it is likely that it can pick out the silhouette of its prey or spot fish with bioluminescent patches on their undersides.
4)$!,"2%%$).' #APELINEGGSMAKEAGOODMEAL FORMANYINVERTEBRATESANDFISH 4OPROTECTTHEIREGGS LARGE NUMBERSOFADULTCAPELINSWIM INTOVERYSHALLOWWATERATHIGH TIDEANDSPAWNONSANDYBEACHES JUSTBELOWTHETIDELINE%ACH FEMALEPRODUCESABOUT REDDISH STICKYEGGS WHICHLIEIN THESAND7HENTHEEGGSHATCH AFTERABOUTDAYS THELARVAEARE WASHEDOUTOFTHESANDBYTHE INCOMINGTIDEANDTHENSWEPT OUTTOSEAONTHEOUTGOINGTIDE
OCEAN LIFE
DEPTH
barbels around the mouth to find worms, crustaceans, and mollusks hidden in the sand. During the day, they hide among rocks. Plotosids are the only catfish found in coral reefs. This species also ventures along open coasts and into estuaries. It spawns in the summer months. Male striped catfish build nests in shallow, rocky areas and guard the eggs for about ten days. The larvae are planktonic.
348
animal life ORDER SALMONIFORMES
Atlantic Salmon Salmo salar Up to 5 ft
LENGTH
(1.5 m) Up to 100 lb
WEIGHT
(45 kg) DEPTH
Mostly surface
waters Temperate and cold waters of north Atlantic and adjacent rivers
DISTRIBUTION
While most marine fish would quickly die in fresh water, the Atlantic salmon can move easily between river and sea. Fish with this ability are called anadromous. Designed for long-distance swimming, this fish has a powerful, streamlined body and a large tail. During their spawning runs, Atlantic salmon swim against strong river currents and leap up waterfalls to reach their spawning grounds. Before spawning, the salmon roam the north Atlantic for several years feeding on other fish. The Atlantic salmon is highly prized as a game fish, but wild salmon are becoming increasingly rare. HUMAN IMPACT
3!,-/.&!2-).' &LOATINGFISHFARMSREARING !TLANTICSALMONARECOMMONIN 3COTTISHSEALOCHSAND.ORWEGIAN FIORDS9OUNGSALMONFRY ARE HATCHEDINHATCHERIESANDREAREDIN SUBMERGEDNETS%NVIRONMENTAL CONCERNSABOUTFISHFARMSFOCUS ONTHECHEMICALSUSEDTOKILLFISH LICE ANDTHEEFFECTSOFHIGHLEVELS OFNUTRIENTSINTHEWATER
ORDER SALMONIFORMES
ORDER SALMONIFORMES
Coho Salmon
Arctic Char
Oncorhynchus kisutch
Salvelinus alpinus
LENGTH
Up to 3 ft (1 m)
LENGTH
Up to 3 ft (1 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 33 lb
WEIGHT
Up to 33 lb
(15 kg)
(15 kg)
0–820 ft (0–250 m)
DEPTH
0–230 ft (0–70 m)
DEPTH
Temperate and cold waters of north Pacific and adjacent rivers
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
Like most other salmon, the coho salmon is a fast, streamlined predator with excellent eyesight for spotting its prey. This makes it a challenging game fish for anglers. When ready to breed, mature fish find their way from the ocean back to the same river in which they were born. While swimming upstream, they develop bright red sides and a green head and back. When they reach the shallow waters at the river’s head, the females dig a nest, which is called a redd, in the gravel of the riverbed and lay their sticky eggs while the male fertilizes them. After spawning, the adults die and their bodies provide a feast for scavenging bears and other animals.
Arctic Ocean and northern freshwater rivers and lakes
DISTRIBUTION
Arctic char are adapted for life in cold, oxygen-rich water and cannot tolerate warm or polluted water. There are two physiological races: a migratory form that lives in the sea but spawns in rivers, and a land-locked lake form. Migratory char grow to at least 3 ft (1 m) long and are regarded as excellent game fish. Shortly after the last ice age, they ranged much farther south but are now restricted to Arctic waters. The char that live in mountain lakes are relicts of this period.
ORDER STOMIIFORMES
Sloane’s Viperfish Chauliodus sloani LENGTH
Up to 14 in
(35 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 1 oz (30 g)
1,600–6,000 ft (475–1,800 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and temperate waters
worldwide
Deep-water fish are some of the most bizarre of all fish, and Sloane’s viperfish is no exception. At one end of its slender body it has a large head with huge, barbed teeth, while at the other it has a tiny forked tail. Rows of photophores run along the sides and belly and light the fish up like a nightflying airplane. During the day, it stays in deep water, but at night it migrates upward to feed where prey is more abundant. The single dorsal fin, just behind the head, has a very long first ray that can be arched over the head and may help entice prey within reach. Sloane’s viperfish spawns throughout the year. It is one of nine species of viperfish, all deep-living.
bony fishes ORDER STOMIIFORMES
Pacific Blackdragon Idiacanthus antrostomus LENGTH
Up to 15 in
(38 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 2 oz (55 g)
650–3,300 ft (200–1,000 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION Deep, tropical and temperate waters of eastern Pacific
thin tail
The Pacific blackdragon haunts the depths of the ocean, its black snakelike body lit up by photophores along its belly. When it opens its mouth, it reveals a set of long, dagger-sharp teeth. Hanging off the lower jaw is a barbel tipped by a glowing lure that can be moved to entice prey to venture within reach. The Pacific blackdragon is black on the inside as well as the outside, its black stomach preventing light from swallowed bioluminescent prey shining out. Male Pacific blackdragons are only about a quarter the size of the females. In the closely related species Idiacanthus fascicola, the young fish are similar in shape to the adults, but their eyes stick out on very long stalks. The stalks are absorbed as the fish grows and the eyes eventually come to lie in their sockets.
red-light photophore mouth filled with teeth
ORDER STOMIIFORMES
Stoplight Loosejaw photophores
Malacosteus niger LENGTH
Up to 91/2 in
(24 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded
3,300–13,000 ft (1,000–4,000 m)
DEPTH
snakelike body
DISTRIBUTION
Deep tropical and temperate waters
worldwide barbel with lure
ORDER STOMIIFORMES
ORDER AULOPIFORMES
Lovely Hatchetfish
Tripodfish
Argyropelecus aculeatus
Bathypterois grallator
LENGTH
Up to 3 in
LENGTH
(8 cm) WEIGHT
(37 cm) Not recorded
WEIGHT
330–2,000 ft (100–600 m)
Tropical and temperate waters
worldwide
An expert at hiding from predators, the hatchetfish’s silvery coloration and use of bioluminescence conceals it against the downwelling light. They are also so thin that they are difficult to see head-on. This fish lives at medium depths and has large bulging eyes to make best use of what little light there is. At dusk, it rises up to 330–1,000 ft (100–300 m) to feed on small planktonic animals.
Not recorded
2,900–11,500 ft (875–3,500 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Up to 15 in
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Deep waters of Atlantic, Pacific, and
Indian oceans
Like many other deep-sea fish, the stoplight loosejaw is black, relatively small, and has a large mouth. However, it is unique in that it has no floor to The deep ocean floor where the tripodfish lives consists largely of soft mud. So, to prevent itself from sinking into the ooze while lying in wait for its prey, this fish perches on a tripod made from elongated rays of its pelvic and caudal fins. Facing into the current, it waits for small crustaceans to drift within reach, catching them in its mouth, which has a large gape. The tripodfish has very small eyes and is thought to detect its prey by feeling for tiny vibrations in the water.
ORDER AULOPIFORMES
Reef Lizardfish Synodus variegatus LENGTH 8–16 in (20–40 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded
16–295 ft (5–90 m)
DEPTH
Tropical reefs in Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
brown and red coloration camouflages the reef lizardfish, hiding it from larger predators. It can also bury itself in patches of sand, leaving only its head and eyes showing. Confident of its disguise, this fish will remain completely still and allow divers to approach to within a few inches before darting away to a new perch. It is caught and eaten by reef fishermen.
its mouth, hence its name. Instead, a ribbon of muscle that joins the gill basket and the lower jaw contracts to shut the mouth. This arrangement may allow the fish a wider gape and a faster strike at prey. This fish is also a specialist in light production. It has two large photophores under each eye, one that produces normal blue-green bioluminescence and the other red. No natural red light reaches these depths, so most deep-sea creatures cannot see it. The red bioluminescence reflects well off a red animal, such as a shrimp, but the shrimp will be unaware that it has been spotlighted.
ORDER MYCTOPHIFORMES
Spotted Lanternfish Myctophum punctatum LENGTH
Up to 41/4 in
(11 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded
0–3,300 ft (0–1,000 m) DEPTH
Deep waters of north Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
The spotted lanternfish is one of over 250 species of lanternfish found in the world’s oceans. Lanternfish are rather unprepossessing, small spindle-shaped fish with large eyes. However, in spite of their drab appearance they can put on an unrivaled display of light from an array of photophores along their sides and belly. In some species, males and females have different patterns of photophores, and this helps them to find each other in the dark depths. Photophore patterns also differ between species. Large shoals of spotted lanternfish are common in the north Atlantic. Along with other lanternfish, it is an important food source for larger fish, sea birds, and marine mammals. During the day it stays in deep water, at 800– 2,500 ft (250–750 m), but at night it swims up to within about 330 ft (100 m) or even right to the surface, where it feeds on planktonic crustaceans and fish fry.
OCEAN LIFE
The reef lizardfish habitually perches on the tops of rocks and corals, propped up on its long pelvic fins. From such vantage points, it keeps a lookout for passing shoals of fish, darting out and seizing one with its rows of sharp teeth. Its large mouth allows it to swallow quite big fish (as shown in the photograph). A variable blotchy
349
350
animal life ORDER LAMPRIFORMES
ORDER LAMPRIFORMES
Opah
Oarfish
Lampris guttatus
Regalecus glesne LENGTH
Up to 6 ft (2 m)
LENGTH
Up to 36 ft (11 m)
110–600 lb (50–275 kg)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Up to 600 lb (270 kg)
330–1,300 ft (100–400 m)
DEPTH
0–3,300 ft (0–1,000 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical, subtropical, and temperate waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
Roaming the oceans worldwide, the opah leads a nomadic existence. Shaped like a gigantic oval dinner plate, this colorful fish is a steely blue and green with silvery spots and red fins. Although it is toothless, the opah is an efficient hunter, catching squid and small fish. Rather than using its tail to swim, like most fish, it flies through the water by beating its long, narrow pectoral fins like a pair of wings. Opah regularly reach a weight of 110 lb (50 kg), although specimens as heavy as 600 lb (270 kg) have been reported. They spawn in the spring, laying eggs midwater, which hatch into larvae after 21 days. Also known as the moonfish, the opah is a valuable food fish in the Hawaiian Islands and on the west coast of mainland US. It is caught on long lines and with gill nets.
At up to 36 ft (11 m) in length, the oarfish is the longest bony fish known to science and is thought to be responsible for many sea serpent
ORDER GADIFORMES
Atlantic Cod Gadus morhua LENGTH
Up to 6 ft (2 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 200 lb
(90 kg) 0–2,000 ft (0–600 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Temperate and cold waters of north
Atlantic
Tropical, subtropical, and temperate waters worldwide
legends. Its bizarre appearance is enhanced by a crest of long red rays on its short, bluish head, which are followed by a bright red dorsal fin that runs the length of its silvery body. Its name comes from the pelvic fins, both of which extend as a single, long ray ending in an expanded tip, which looks like the blade of an oar. In the open ocean, the oarfish drifts in the currents, feeding on other fish and squid, its great length protecting it from most predators. Although it lives in tropical and temperate waters worldwide, the oarfish is rarely caught or seen alive, so little is known about its behavior. It was first photographed underwater in 1997 in the Bahamas.
ORDER GADIFORMES
Bib Trisopterus luscus LENGTH
Up to 18 in
(46 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 51/2 lb
(2.5 kg) 10–330 ft (3–100 m)
DEPTH
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and western Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Divers often see shoals of striped bib around rocky reefs and shipwrecks. These are usually younger fish or adults that have moved inshore to spawn. Large old fish often lose their banded pattern and become very dark. The bib has a much deeper body than most of its relatives in the family Gadidae. A long chin barbel and long pelvic fins help it to find crustaceans, mollusks, and worms to eat. The Atlantic cod is a powerful, heavily built fish with a large head, an overhanging upper jaw, and a single long chin barbel. It has small, elongated scales. The coloration varies from reddish, especially in young fish, to a mottled brown with a conspicuous white lateral line. The Atlantic cod is a shoal-forming fish, living in water over the continental shelf, and usually feeding at 100–250 ft (30–80 m) above areas of flat mud or sand. Adults migrate to established breeding grounds to spawn, usually in the early
spring, with each female releasing squareseveral million eggs ended tail into the water. Atlantic cod can live for 60 years and mature fish can reach a weight of over 200 lb (90 kg), but modern fishing techniques mean that most cod today are caught long before they reach this age and weight. The average weight is now 24 lb (11 kg) and specimens over 33 lb (15 kg) are rare. It is still one of the world’s most commercially important species, however.
FINS AND SCALES
The Atlantic cod has three dorsal fins and two anal fins. Its small scales have growth rings, which can be counted to give its age. HUMAN IMPACT
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OCEAN LIFE
Stocks of Atlantic cod were once thought to be inexhaustible, but numbers of this once-abundant fish have declined drastically over most of its range. Cod exist as a number of discrete populations, or stocks, that spawn in specific areas in water about 660 ft (200 m) deep. Important stocks include those in the North Sea, northeast Arctic Ocean, Labrador Sea, and the Grand Banks. The latter stock collapsed due to overfishing some years ago and has still not fully recovered.
FORAGING FOR FOOD
Atlantic cod feed both in midwater and on the seabed. They eat shoaling fish, such as herring, and also crustaceans, worms, and mollusks.
bony fishes ORDER GADIFORMES
ORDER GADIFORMES
Shore Rockling
Pacific Grenadier
Gaidropsarus mediterraneus
Coryphaenoides acrolepis
LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 20 in (50 cm)
Up to 3 ft (1 m)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Up to
21/4
Up to 61/2 lb (3 kg)
lb (1 kg)
1,000–12,000 ft (300–3,700 m)
DEPTH
DEPTH
0–1,500 ft (0–450 m) DISTRIBUTION Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Rockling are eel-like in appearance, with two dorsal fins. The first of these is a fringe of short rays that ripple constantly. The shore rockling can be found in rock pools, where it uses its mouth barbels to find food. Most are dark brown, but some are paler.
The Pacific grenadier is one of about 300 different species of grenadiers that are found just off continental shelves and are abundant in every ocean. Grenadiers are also known as rattails because they have a large, bulbous head with big eyes, a sharp snout, and a long, scaly tail. The Pacific grenadier is dark brown with a tall dorsal fin. Another low fin runs along the back and all the way around the tail. This species spends most of its time near the seabed searching for food but it sometimes swims up into midwater, where it can catch squid, shrimp, and small fish.
ORDER GADIFORMES
Torsk Brosme brosme Up to 4 ft (1.2 m)
26–66 lb (12–30 kg)
WEIGHT
65–3,300 ft (20–1,000 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Temperate and cold waters of north
Atlantic
ORDER OPHIDIIFORMES
Pearlfish Carapus acus LENGTH
Up to 8 in (21 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
To 330 ft (100 m) DISTRIBUTION Mediterranean; occasionally found in subtropical waters of eastern Atlantic
The adult pearlfish has a most unusual home—it lives inside the body cavity of sea cucumbers. To allow it to slip in and out of its host easily, it has an eel-like body, no pelvic fins, and no scales. It is a silvery-white color with reddish markings. At night, the pearlfish may swim out of the sea cucumber’s anus to go hunting for invertebrates to eat, returning to the body cavity tail first. However, the pearlfish may also eat the gonads and other organs of its host.
This heavily built member of the order Gadiformes lurks among rocks and pebbles in deep water offshore, where it searches for crustaceans and mollusks. It has thick lips, a long chin barbel, and a long dorsal and anal fin, each edged in white. In summer, two to three million eggs are laid, which float and develop near the surface. This species can live for 20 years. Torsk is fished commercially, especially off Norway, using trawls and lines, and it is also caught by anglers.
ORDER BATRACHOIDIFORMES
Oyster Toadfish Opsanus tau Up to 17 in
LENGTH
(43 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 41/4 lb
(2.2 kg) DEPTH
Not recorded
Temperate and subtropical waters of northwestern Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
Some people would consider the oyster toadfish an ugly animal, with its flat head, wide, toadlike mouth, and thick lips. It also has tassels around its chin, prominent eyes, and two dorsal fins, the first of which is spiny. Its shape and coloration provide camouflage in its home under rocks and debris. This hardy fish tolerates dirty and trash-strewn water and
ORDER OPHIDIIFORMES
Spotted Cusk-eel Chilara taylori LENGTH
Up to 15 in
(37 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded
Temperate and subtropical waters of
eastern Pacific
As it is a favorite food of sea lions, cormorants, and other diving birds, the spotted cusk-eel is most active at night or on gloomy, sunless days. If
danger threatens, this eel-shaped fish can quickly slip between rocky rubble or bury itself tail-first in sand or mud. Unlike true eels, it has scales and pelvic fins. The latter are reduced to one split ray set very far forward under the head. Its eggs are laid in open water and hatch into larvae that live close to the surface. These develop into juveniles that drift for an extended period before settling down to a seabed existence. While the spotted cusk-eel lives in shallow water, one of its close relatives, the basketweave cusk-eel, has been found over 26,000 ft (8,000 m) deep in the abyssal zone (see p.182), the greatest depth for any fish.
#/5243()0#!,,3 0EOPLELIVINGINHOUSEBOATSALONG THEEASTCOASTOFTHE53ARE SOMETIMESKEPTAWAKEATNIGHT DURING!PRILTO/CTOBERBYLOUD GRUNTINGNOISES4HECULPRITSARE MALEOYSTERTOADFISHCALLINGTO ATTRACTFEMALESTOLAYTHEIREGGSIN NESTSDUGUNDERROCKS4HEMALE MAKESTHESENOISESBYVIBRATING THEWALLSOFHISSWIMBLADDER USINGSPECIALMUSCLES4HESWIM BLADDERWALLACTSLIKETHESKIN OVERADRUM4HEMALEGUARDS THEEGGSUNTILTHEYHATCHAFTER ABOUTFOURWEEKS is often found under jetties. It has been reared in captivity for use in experiments. It also does well in aquariums and is a popular game fish.
OCEAN LIFE
0–900 ft (0–280 m)
DEPTH
Deep, temperate waters of north
Pacific
LENGTH
DISTRIBUTION
351
352
sensory hairs
large mouth
ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
Hairy Angler Caulophryne jordani LENGTH Females up to 8 in (20 cm); males not recorded, but tiny WEIGHT
Not recorded
330–5,000 ft (100–1,500 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Deep water worldwide
Anglerfish include some of the most bizarrely shaped fish in the ocean, and the hairy angler certainly fits into this category. It has a huge mouth, tiny eyes, and large dorsal and anal fins
with very long projecting fin rays. It is also covered in sensory hairs, giving it a disheveled appearance. Like most anglerfish, it has a movable lure on top of the head that is formed from the first spine of the dorsal fin. The biology of the hairy angler is poorly known as only a few specimens have ever been captured. However, in other deep-sea anglerfish, this lure is used to attract prey within reach. The fish then opens its mouth and creates a sudden, strong inward suction current. The prey is engulfed within a fraction of a second. Food is scarce in the deep sea and anglerfish living here usually have extra-large mouths and expandable stomachs that allow them
to swallow prey as big or bigger than themselves. The hairy angler belongs to the family Caulophrynidae, also known as fanfins. The males of fish in this family are tiny and do not have lures. They live as parasites on the females when they are adults. This
ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
Deep-sea Angler Bufoceratias wedli Females up to 10 in (25 cm); males not recorded
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Not recorded
1,000–5,700 ft (300–1,750 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea,
and Atlantic
ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
OCEAN LIFE
Polka-dot Batfish Ogcocephalus radiatus LENGTH
Up to 15 in (38 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
0–230 ft (0–70 m) Subtropical waters of western Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico
DISTRIBUTION
Fish of the family Ogcocephalidae, to which the polka-dot batfish belongs, are among the most oddly shaped of the anglerfish. They prop themselves up on paired pectoral and pelvic fins that enable them to walk over the seabed in search of worms, crustaceans, and fish. Although the polka-dot batfish has a fishing lure, this is very short and evidence suggests it may secrete an odor that attracts potential prey. A hard, spiny skin protects these fish from predators, but they are so sluggish that divers can pick them up.
Living in the deep sea, this small, dark-colored anglerfish has a round body, delicate fins, and a luminescent lure at the end of a long rod called an illicium. A second, much smaller rod on the head is often hidden from view. It has a weak skeleton and small muscles that make it relatively light
species is often difficult to identify because so few are caught and they are often damaged from contact with nets and from changes in pressure as they are brought to the surface. and able to float more easily. It has no need to swim much as it lures its prey within reach. Female deep-sea anglers have been caught undamaged by research submarines using a piece of equipment called a slurp gun that sucks animals into a container. The fish have then been photographed alive. Males have not yet been seen but are likely to be tiny and free-living. rod and lure
round body
bony fishes ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
Coffinfish
Common Blackdevil
Chaunax endeavouri LENGTH
Melanocetus johnsonii Up to 9 in
(22 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded
160–1,000 ft (50–300 m) DEPTH
Temperate waters of southwestern Pacific, off east coast of Australia
DISTRIBUTION
The coffinfish resembles a pink balloon covered in tiny spines and can make itself look bigger by inflating its body. It belongs to a family of
Females 7 in (18 cm); males 11/4 in (3 cm)
LENGTH
anglerfish called Chaunacidae, or sea toads, that have large, flabby bodies and loose skin. Like other anglerfish, it has a lure, but this is very small and can be hidden in a depression on the snout. Little is known of its life history, but it spends most of its time lying quietly on the bottom in muddy areas. It is usually found in deep water on the continental shelf and slope, but has also been found in water as shallow as 165 ft (50 m).
WEIGHT
Not recorded
To 6,600 ft (2,000 m) DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Deep waters of Atlantic, Pacific, and
Indian oceans
This deep-sea anglerfish is also known as the humpback angler. The female common blackdevil has a huge head and large jaws with very long, daggerlike teeth, which are used to catch
ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
prey that may be larger than she is. Her stretchy stomach and loosely attached skin help her to accommodate these huge meals. Although the female is not completely blind, her eyes are tiny and she probably cannot see her prey until she has enticed it within range using her glowing lure. By contrast, the male is tiny and uses his acute sense of smell to find a mate. He has no teeth but hangs on to the female with special hooks on his snout. When she has laid her eggs and he has fertilized them, he swims away, but how long he then lives is not known. Both male and female juveniles live near the surface, where they feed on small planktonic animals.
glowing lure
Sargassumfish Histrio histrio LENGTH
Up to 8 in
(20 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded
About 0–36 ft (0–11 m) DEPTH
Tropical and subtropical seas worldwide; not recorded in eastern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This unusual frogfish (family Anternnariidae) lives in floating rafts of sargassum seaweed. It uses its prehensile, leglike pectoral fins to large lure
clasp clumps of weed and scramble around the rafts. With its skin tassels, mottled pattern, and variable color, the sargassumfish is well camouflaged and able to lure small fish and shrimp within striking range. If threatened, it can scramble onto the top of the seaweed raft. These fish are sometimes washed ashore with their rafts. spines
fanlike fin
long, sharp teeth
ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
Regan’s Angler Haplophryne mollis Females 3 in (8 cm); males 3/4 in (2 cm)
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Not recorded
650–6,600 ft (200–2,000 m) DEPTH
ORDER LOPHIIFORMES
Angler
DISTRIBUTION
Lophius piscatorius LENGTH
Up to 6 ft (2 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 125 lb
(57 kg) 65–3,300 ft (20–1,000 m) DEPTH
Northeastern Atlantic south to West Africa, Mediterranean, and Black Sea
DISTRIBUTION
The angler has a head like a flattened soccer ball fringed by a camouflage of seaweed-shaped flaps of skin, and a wide, flattened body that tapers toward the tail. Its darkly marbled
greenish-brown skin also helps the angler to blend into the sediment of the sea floor. It lies patiently on the seabed, ready to suck in any fish it can entice within range by flicks of the fleshy fishing lure on its dorsal fin. Large anglers have even been known to lunge up and catch diving birds. The species has well-developed pectoral fins, set on armlike bases, with sharp “elbows” that allow it to shuffle along over the seafloor. Anglerfish of the genus Lophius are also known as goosefishes or fishing frogs. This species is commercially exploited and sold as “monkfish.”
Tropical and subtropical deep waters
worldwide
This unusual deep-sea anglerfish has unpigmented skin. The female of the species has an almost round body when mature, numerous very small teeth, spines above the eyes and behind the mouth, and a minimal fishing lure that consists of just a small flap on the snout. Like many other deep-sea anglerfish, the males of this species remain very small all their lives and their sole aim in life is to track down a female using their excellent sense of smell and latch onto her using special hooks. Finding a mate in the
depths of the ocean is difficult and by keeping the male attached, the female is assured that her eggs will be fertilized. The males eventually turn into parasites, biting into the female’s skin. In time, their blood supplies fuse and the male then becomes nourished by the female. Up to three males have been found on a single female. unpigmented, translucent skin
353
354
animal life ORDER GOBIESOCIFORMES
Shore Clingfish Lepadogaster lepadogaster LENGTH
3 in (7 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
0–6 ft (0–2 m)
over rocks and seaweeds and searching in rock pools. The color of the shore clingfish is variable, but it always has two blue spots outlined in brown, red, or black behind its head, and it has a small tentacle in front of each eye. In the spring or summer, females lay clusters of golden yellow eggs on the undersides of rocks on the shore. The eggs are guarded by the parent fish until they hatch.
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic, Mediterranean, and Black Sea
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER BELONIFORMES
Atlantic Flyingfish
Strong waves are no problem to this little fish—it can cling to rocks with a powerful sucker formed from its pelvic fins. It also has a low-profile body and a flattened, triangular head with a long snout that resembles a duck’s bill. This shape allows the fish to slip easily between the rocks and, because it is only a few centimetres long, it may be difficult to spot, but it can be found by turning
ORDER BELONIFORMES
Hound Needlefish Tylosurus crocodiles LENGTH
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m) WEIGHT
Up to 14 lb (6.5 kg) DEPTH
0–43 ft (0–13 m) DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters over coral reefs
worldwide
Cheilopogon heterurus LENGTH
Up to 16 in (40 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
Surface waters DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and warm temperate waters
worldwide
Rendered almost invisible by its silvery color and needle-like shape, the hound needlefish swims along just beneath the surface, hunting for other fish that also live over coral reefs. Its long, thin snout is shaped like a spear, and it has been known to puncture small boats and cause severe injury to people by shooting up into the air when frightened. Although edible, the hound needlefish is not popular as a food fish because it has green-colored flesh.
ORDER BELONIFORMES
Atlantic Saury Scomberesox saurus LENGTH
Up to 20 in (50 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
0–100 ft (0–30 m) North, northwestern, and eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER BERYCIFORMES
Also known as the Mediterranean flyingfish, this species is distinguished by its very large, winglike pectoral and pelvic fins. If a predator, such as a tuna, attacks from below, the fish will beat its powerful forked tail rapidly, spread its “wings” at the last moment, and lift clear of the surface away from danger. The fish continues to beat its tail even in mid-flight and it can remain airborne for over 330 ft (100 m). The Atlantic flyingfish is edible, but is not commercially exploited. Although not as thin as its needlefish relatives, the Atlantic saury has a similar narrow body and a long, beaklike snout lined with tiny teeth. The body is clear green above and bright silver on the sides. It has a single dorsal and anal fin, each followed by a series of small finlets. This fish lives in large schools that chase and capture smaller fish and shrimplike crustaceans while skimming along at the surface. It is fished commercially and is caught by being attracted to bright lights at night.
ORDER BERYCIFORMES
Pineapplefish
Eyelight Fish
Cleidopus gloriamaris
Photoblepharon palpebratum
LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 9 in (22 cm)
5 in (12 cm)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Up to 16 oz (500 g)
Not recorded
10–650 ft (3–200 m)
DEPTH
DEPTH
Temperate waters of eastern Indian Ocean and southwestern Pacific around Australia
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER BERYCIFORMES
Whitetip Soldierfish Myripristis vittata LENGTH
Up to 10 in (25 cm)
OCEAN LIFE
WEIGHT
Not recorded 10–260 ft ( 3–80 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of Indian and Pacific
oceans
Soldierfish are nocturnal coral-reef residents that hide in groups in caves and beneath overhangs on steep reefs during the daytime. The whitetip
soldierfish is red, as are most members of its family (Holocentridae). The leading edges of its median fins are white. At depth, where natural red light does not penetrate, the fish’s red color appears black or gray, providing it with camouflage, especially on the deeper parts of the reef. Like many nocturnal fish, the whitetip soldierfish has large eyes, which help it to spot planktonic animals by dim moonlight and then snap them up. It has a short, blunt snout, large scales, and a deeply forked tail. Divers have observed that some individuals in a group of whitetip soldierfish often swim along upside down.
The pineapplefish is completely encased in armor consisting of large, thick, modified scales studded with spines. Each yellow scale is outlined in black, resembling a segment of pineapple skin. This fish, which lives in dark caves and under ledges on rocky reefs, has a pair of bioluminescent organs on its lower jaw that are hidden by the upper jaw when the mouth is closed. Orange during the day, the organs glow blue-green at night, when they are used to help find prey, such as crustaceans and small fish.
23–82 ft (7–25 m) DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of western and
central Pacific
The most characteristic feature of this small fish is the large light organ under each eye. The blue-green light can be turned on and off using a black membrane like an eyelid. These fish are active at night, often feeding in large groups, and use the light to signal to other individuals, startle predators, and find small planktonic animals to feed on. Eyelight fish are sometimes seen at night by divers on steep reef faces. Daytime sightings are rare, as these fish usually hide in caves during the day.
bony fishes ORDER BERYCIFORMES
Common Fangtooth Anoplogaster cornuta LENGTH
6–7 in (15–18 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded 1,600–16,000 ft (500–5,000 m)
DEPTH
DISTRIBUTION Deep waters in temperate and tropical waters worldwide
The huge, saberlike teeth of this deep-water predator are designed to grab and hold onto other fish that may be as big as it is. The teeth are no good for cutting or chewing and so the common fangtooth swallows its prey whole, rather like a snake does. Adults are uniformly black or dark brown in color and can live as deep as 16,000 ft (5,000 m), but they are most common between 1,600–6,500 ft (500 and 2,000 m). They hunt by themselves or in small shoals,
searching for other fish to eat. Juvenile common fangtooths look very different from the adults and were classified as a separate species until 1955. They are light gray in color and have long spines on the head. They live in water as shallow as 160 ft (50 m) and feed mainly on crustaceans. Adult females shed their eggs directly into the sea, where they develop into planktonic larvae. The juveniles take on the adult shape when they are about 3 in (8 cm) long.
355
ORDER BERYCIFORMES
Orange Roughy Hoplostethus atlanticus LENGTH 20–30 in (50–75 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 15 lb (7 kg)
3,000–6,000 ft (900–1,800 m)
DEPTH
North and south Atlantic, Indian Ocean, southwestern and eastern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This is one of the longest-lived fish species, with individuals having been recorded to reach at least 149 years old. It is a bright, brick-red color, but appears black in the dark waters in which it lives and this helps to hide it from predators. The orange roughy is a deepbodied fish with a large head, armed with spines behind the eyes and on the gill covers. The scales on the belly also have sharp spines. Orange roughy live in deep water in rugged, rocky areas and over steep, rough ground, and have a relatively limited home range. soft rays
ORDER ZEIFORMES
John Dory Zeus faber LENGTH
Up to 3 ft (90 cm)
WEIGHT
Up to 18 lb
(8 kg) 15–1,300 ft (5–400 m)
DEPTH
Eastern Atlantic, Mediterranean, Black Sea, Indian Ocean, western and southwestern Pacific.
DISTRIBUTION
The John Dory has one of the most distinctive appearances of all fish, with a rounded but very thin body, a heavy mouth, and tall fins. It is an expert hunter, stealthily approaching its prey head-on. In this attitude, its thin body is almost invisible and it can approach other fish closely. When it comes within striking range, it shoots out its protrusible jaws and engulfs its victim.
soft second dorsal fin
OCEAN LIFE
dark mark like a thumbprint
spiny first dorsal fin
DEEP-SEA FISHING
Trawling for fish in small boats is an arduous and often hazardous way of earning a living. Many fishermen have perished at sea over the years.
357
fishing Exploitation of the sea’s bounty has given humans
TRADITIONAL FISHING Traditional fishing using small-scale fishing gear is rarely a threat to fish stocks. Fish is an important food source, particularly in countries in the developing world, where it provides up to 80 percent of total protein needs. Fishing is also a vital part of the economy in these countries. And yet, such localized, traditional fisheries take only about 10 percent of the global total catch.
FISHING AND THE ENVIRONMENT
DAMAGE AND WASTE
BOTTOM TRAWLING Fishing gear dragged across the seabed damages marine life and stirs up sediment, smothering wildlife on nearby rocks. Heavy metal scallop dredges are particularly harmful.
HAZARDS TO WILDLIFE
high-quality food and many useful by-products, and sustains coastal communities around the world. Fish have long been seen as a vast resource that could never run out. However, there are signs that modern, industrial-scale fishing methods are taking their toll. Some fish stocks have already collapsed, and others are thought to be beyond recovery. The total global recorded catch of fish and shellfish rose steadily from 16 million tons in 1950 to 86 million tons in 1995, with a few dips associated with poor anchovy catches in El Niño years (see p.68–69). However, since then catches have leveled off and actually decreased between 2001 and 2004. The problems of ensuring a sustainable harvest from the sea are many. One fundamental difficulty is the “ownership” of stocks. There is little incentive for some to stop fishing in order to conserve fish if others continue, legally or illegally. It is difficult to police fisheries on the high seas, and illegal fishing is rife in some areas. It is notoriously problematic to obtain an accurate assessment of mobile fish stocks, and illegal fishing and trading distort catch statistics. Most large-scale fishing methods are indiscriminate and there is enormous waste, as unwanted fish and invertebrate species are discarded, and vast numbers of cetaceans, turtles, and sea birds are also caught. Huge amounts of fish such as sand eels are caught in industrial fisheries and turned into fishmeal to feed pigs, poultry, and other livestock, which is an inefficient conversion of protein. However, not all fishing is bad, and there is increasing guidance for consumers wishing to support well-managed fisheries and non-damaging fishing methods.
SHRIMP AND BYCATCH In every catch of shrimp, up to ten times their weight of other species is also caught in the net and subsequently discarded.
FISHING GEAR Thousands of animals die needlessly each year entangled in fishing tackle. This Hawaiian monk seal is one of a total population of just 1,500. GREEN TURTLE Drifting longlines for tuna, often dozens of miles long with thousands of hooks, also kill turtles, sharks, and marine birds. SCALLOP FARMING Farming scallops is an environmentally sound practice that avoids the adverse effects of trawling on the sea bed and other species.
OCEAN LIFE
STILT FISHING This method of fishing is still practiced in parts of Sri Lanka and Thailand. The fishermen cast their lines while perching on poles in shallow water.
FISH FARMING
PEN-RAISED TUNA Fattening of wild tuna in cages falls between fishing and aquaculture legislation, and there are fears that this practice is further depleting overfished stocks.
358
animal life ORDER SYNGNATHIFORMES
Leafy Seadragon Phycodorus eques LENGTH
14 in (35 cm) WEIGHT
It is hard to imagine anything less fishlike than the leafy seadragon. The bizarre tassels and frills that adorn its head and body form a spectacular camouflage that fools both predators and prey. Even its body and tail are bent and twisted to resemble seaweed stems. Closely related to
seahorses, the leafy seadragon has a similar, but much longer, tubular snout. This is an effective feeding tool—the fish aims its snout at a small shrimp and then sucks
Not recorded DEPTH
13–100 ft (4–30 m)
hard, rather like a person would on a drinking straw. The leafy seadragon lives on rocky, seaweed-covered reefs and in seagrass beds. Unlike seahorses, it cannot coil its tail around an object. It moves very slowly and sways with the waves, mimicking the seaweed. Like seahorses and pipefish, the female deposits her eggs in a brood pouch under the male’s tail and he carries them until they hatch.
Eastern Indian Ocean, along the southern coast of Australia
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER SYNGNATHIFORMES
Trumpetfish Aulostomus maculatus LENGTH
Up to 3 ft (1 m)
hunts by lying in wait to ambush passing shoals of fish, but it is also known to follow predatory fish such as moray eels and steal some of the fish that they flush from their hiding places.
ORDER SYNGNATHIFORMES
Harlequin Ghost Pipefish Solenostomus paradoxus LENGTH
WEIGHT
5 in (12 cm)
Not recorded
WEIGHT
DEPTH
Not recorded
7–80 ft (2–25 m)
DEPTH
Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea, and subtropical waters of western Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
Not recorded Tropical reefs in Indian Ocean and western and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
The trumpetfish looks like a piece of drifting wood, hiding itself among sea fans and other corals. It has a long, slender, straight body, and when it flares open its mouth, its long snout resembles a thin trumpet. The trumpetfish is usually brown, but some individuals have a yellow body. It
ORDER SYNGNATHIFORMES
Short-snouted Seahorse Hippocampus hippocampus
ORDER SYNGNATHIFORMES
Snake Pipefish Entelurus aequoreus LENGTH
Up to 24 in (60 cm)
OCEAN LIFE
WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
33–330 ft (10–100 m) DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern
Atlantic
At first sight, the snake pipefish could easily be mistaken for a small sea snake. It has a long, smooth, rounded body tapering to a thin tail with
a minute tail fin. However, like all pipefish and seahorses, its head is drawn out into a distinctive tubular snout for sucking up small floating crustaceans and fish fry. Pipefish have no scales but, instead, the body is encased in segmented bony armor lying beneath the skin. The snake pipefish has an orangebrown body with pale blue bands. It lives among seaweed, where it is well camouflaged. The female lays several hundred eggs into a shallow pouch along the male’s belly during the summer. The eggs develop in the pouch and the young are released when they are about 1/2 in (1 cm) long, but before they are fully developed.
LENGTH
6 in (15 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
16–200 ft (5–60 m) Temperate and subtropical waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
In the seahorse world, it is the males that give birth to the young. After an elaborate courtship dance, the female lays her eggs in a special pouch on the male’s belly. The pouch seals over until the eggs hatch and the tiny baby seahorses emerge. This species is distinguished by its short snout, which is less than a third of the head length.
The harlequin ghost pipefish looks as though it has wings attached to the sides of its long, thin body. In reality, these are greatly enlarged pelvic fins in which the female broods her eggs. The fins are modified to form a pouch, where the eggs remain until they hatch. This uncommon species occurs in a wide variety of bright colors and patterns that mimic the reef feather stars and black corals among which it lives. It also often swims head-down and so gains further camouflage by aligning its body with the branches among which it swims.
bony fishes ORDER SYNGNATHIFORMES
Pygmy Seahorse Hippocampus bargibanti LENGTH
1 in (2.5 cm)
ORDER GASTEROSTEIFORMES
Three-spined Stickleback Gasterosteus aculeatus LENGTH
WEIGHT
4 in (11 cm)
Not recorded
WEIGHT
DEPTH
Not recorded
50–165 ft (15–50 m) DISTRIBUTION
359
DEPTH
Tropical waters of southwestern
0–330 ft (0–100 m)
Pacific
Temperate waters of north Atlantic and north Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This miniature seahorse lives on Muricella sea fans and was originally discovered when a sea fan was collected for an aquarium. It is very difficult to spot as its body is covered in tubercles that exactly match the polyps of its host. Clinging on tightly with its prehensile tail, it reaches out into the water to suck in planktonic animals. Like other seahorses, it has a rigid body made up of bony plates and a head that is tucked in like a tightly reined carriage horse.
ORDER SYNGNATHIFORMES
ORDER SCORPAENIFORMES
Razorfish
Stonefish
Aeoliscus strigatus
Synanceia verrucosa LENGTH
LENGTH
6 in (15 cm)
Up to 16 in (40 cm)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Not recorded
Up to 51/2 lb (2.5 kg)
DEPTH
DEPTH
3–65 ft (1–20 m)
3–100 ft (1–30 m)
Tropical reefs in Indian Ocean and western Pacific
Tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
DISTRIBUTION
The three-spined stickleback is equally at home in fresh water and sea water. It has three sharp spines on its back and a series of bony plates along its sides. This species is best known for its breeding behavior, which involves the male building a tunnel-like nest of plant material into which he entices one or more females to lay their eggs. He fans oxygenated water over the eggs as they develop. The stonefish is the world’s most venomous fish, and its sting is capable of killing a human. Each sharply tipped spine of the dorsal fin has a venom gland at the base from which a duct runs in a groove to the spine tip. Lying quietly on rocks or sediment in the shallows, the stonefish matches its color to its background and is easily stepped on. Its camouflage helps it to ambush passing fish, which are sucked into its cavernous mouth with lightening speed.
While some reef fish habitually swim upside down, razorfish swim in synchronized groups in a vertical position, with their long, tubular snouts pointing down. These strange fish are encased in transparent bony plates that meet in a sharp ridge along the belly, like the edge of a razor, and also form a sharp point at the tail. A dark stripe along the body provides camouflage for the razorfish when hiding among sea urchins and branched corals.
ORDER SCORPAENIFORMES
Lionfish Pterois volitans LENGTH
Up to 15 in (38 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
7–180 ft (2–55 m) Tropical waters of eastern Indian Ocean and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Long-spined Bullhead Taurulus bubalis LENGTH
Up to 10 in (25 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
0–330 ft (0–100 m) Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and western Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Bullheads are small, cold-water relatives of scorpionfish and the stonefish (see above). Like them, they are stout, bottom-living fish with a broad head, large mouth, and spiny fins. The long-spined bullhead also has a long, sharp spine on each cheek. None of its spines is venomous. These small fish can be found in rock pools, but are difficult to spot as they match their color to their background. In the winter, the female lays clumps of eggs between rocks. These are then guarded by the male until they hatch between five and 12 weeks later.
OCEAN LIFE
Although the lionfish can inflict a painful sting, it is not dangerous to humans. Its flamboyant coloration of red stripes serves as a warning both to divers and to would-be predators. Also known as the turkeyfish, it hunts at night using its winglike pectoral fins to trap its prey of fish, shrimp, and crabs against the reef.
ORDER SCORPAENIFORMES
LIONFISH
During the daytime, lionfish hide in rocky parts of the seabed, where they remain motionless. They hunt at night, first cornering their prey and then, in one swift movement, stunning it with one of their venomous spines and swallowing it. There are some reports of lionfish threatening humans.
362
animal life ORDER SCORPAENIFORMES
ORDER SCORPAENIFORMES
Spotted Scorpionfish East Atlantic Scorpaena plumieri Red Gurnard LENGTH
Up to 18 in (45 cm) Up to
Lumpsucker Cyclopterus lumpus
Aspitrigla cuculus
LENGTH
Up to 24 in (60 cm) LENGTH
WEIGHT
31/4
ORDER SCORPAENIFORMES
WEIGHT
Up to 20 in (50 cm)
lb (1.5 kg)
Up to 21 lb (9.5 kg)
WEIGHT
DEPTH
DEPTH
Not recorded
3–200 ft (1–60 m)
DEPTH
Western Atlantic and eastern Atlantic around Ascension Island and St. Helena
DISTRIBUTION
50–1,300 ft (15–400 m)
7–1,300 ft (2–400 m) DISTRIBUTION
Temperate and cold waters of north
Atlantic
The adult lumpsucker (or lumpfish) has a slightly grotesque appearance because the first dorsal fin becomes overgrown with thick, lumpy skin. Other bony lumps and bumps stick out in irregular rows along its large, rounded body. The pelvic fins form a strong sucker disk on its belly, which the lumpsucker uses to cling to wavebattered rocks near the shore where it spawns. The male guards the eggs from crabs and also fans them. Lumpsucker eggs are marketed as substitute caviar.
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Resting quietly on the seabed, the spotted scorpionfish is almost invisible thanks to its mottled color and weedlike skin flaps that cover its head. However, if this fish is disturbed, it can open its large pectoral fins to display dramatic black and whitespotted patches. Flashing these “false eyes” is often enough to frighten off a potential predator, but if this does not work, the spines on its dorsal fin can inflict a poisonous sting.
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Wreckfish
Potato Grouper Epinephelus tukula LENGTH
Up to 7 ft (2 m) WEIGHT
Up to 240 lb (110 kg) DISTRIBUTION
33–500 ft (10–150 m) Tropical waters of Red Sea, Gulf of Aden, and western Pacific
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
Groupers are large and important predators on coral reefs. They help to maintain the health of a reef by picking off weak fish. They also eat crabs and spiny lobsters. The potato grouper inhabits deeper reef channels and seamounts. It has a large head and heavy body with a single long, spiny dorsal fin. Irregular dark blotches cover the body and dark streaks radiate from the eyes. These fish are territorial, and in some areas, individuals are hand-fed by divers. However, one diver drowned after being rammed in the chest by a large potato grouper. The large size of these fish makes them an easy target for spearfishermen.
Fairy Basslet
Polyprion americanus
Pseudanthias squamipinnis
LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 7 ft (2 m)
Up to 6 in (15 cm)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Up to 220 lb (100 kg)
Not recorded
DEPTH
DEPTH
130–2,000 ft (40–600 m)
The East Atlantic red gurnard could be said to be a “walking-talking” fish. The first three rays of the pectoral fins are shaped as separate, thick, fingerlike feelers, which are covered with sensory organs.These feelers are used to “walk” over the seabed and probe for shrimp and crabs. The fish has a large head protected by hard, bony plates and spines and two separate dorsal fins. These gurnards sometimes form shoals, and as the fish move around, they make short, sharp grunting noises by vibrating their swim bladder with special muscles and so stay in contact with other gurnards nearby.They spawn in spring and summer and the eggs and larvae float freely near the surface. Adults live for at least 20 years. Although caught commercially, this species is not a main target for fishing.
ORDER PERCIFORMES
ORDER PERCIFORMES
0–180 m (0–55 m)
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic, Mediterranean, Indian Ocean, and Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Red Sea and tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific
The name of this fish comes from the juveniles’ habit of accompanying drifting wreckage. This is a large, solid fish with a pointed head and a protruding lower jaw. It has a spiny dorsal fin and a bony ridge running across the gill cover. Adult wreckfish live close to the bottom of the sea floor and often lurk inside shipwrecks and caves. Juvenile wreckfish prefer surface waters and can often be approached by snorkelers, presumably because the fish consider the swimmers to be floating wreckage. As the young fish grow, they give up their nomadic life to live near the seabed. Adults are fished using lines and make good
Fairy basslets live around coral outcrops and dropoffs. The larger, more colorful males have a long filament at the front of the dorsal fin, and they defend a harem of females. As they grow larger, the females change sex and turn into males.
bony fishes ORDER PERCIFORMES
Harlequin Sweetlips
363
*56%.),%#/345-%
Plectorhinchus chaetodontoides LENGTH
Up to 28 in (72 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 15 lb (7 kg) DEPTH
3–100 ft (1–30 m) Tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Common Bluestripe Snapper Lutjanus kasmira LENGTH
Up to 16 in (40 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
10–870 ft (3–265 m) Tropical reefs of Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and Pacific DISTRIBUTION
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Red Bandfish Cepola macrophthalma LENGTH
Up to 30 in (80 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
50–1,300 ft (15–400 m) Temperate and subtropical waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean DISTRIBUTION
Very little was known about this strange fish until the 1970s, when divers discovered a population in shallow water around Lundy Island
Divers often see large shoals of common bluestripe snapper around coral and rock outcrops during the day. Their streamlined bodies mean that they can swim fast when they disperse at night to feed on smaller fish and bottom-dwelling crustaceans. They have a single long dorsal fin, which, like all their fins, is bright yellow. The common bluestripe snapper and many other similar species are important commercial fish. Their beautiful colors also make them popular specimens among aquarium-fish enthusiasts. off the west coast of Britain. The red bandfish is shaped like an eel but flattened from side to side, with a long, golden-yellow fin running the length of the body on both sides. In mature males, the fin has a bright blue edge. These fish live in deep mud burrows, emerging just far enough to feed on passing arrow worms and other plankton in the manner of tropical garden eels (see p.345). They also swim free of their burrows at times. In addition to single burrows, colonies of many thousands of individuals have been discovered. The burrows sometimes connect with those of burrowing crabs, and this may be a deliberate association.
Small groups of harlequin sweetlips can often be seen gathered at dusk around large coral heads, waiting to be cleared of parasites by a cleaner wrasse (see p.365). These deep-bodied fish are patterned with small, brownish black spots that break up their outline as they swim among the everchanging shadows on the reef. Their name comes from their thickened lips, which they use to dig out invertebrates from sand.
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Bluecheek Butterflyfish Chaetodon semilarvatus LENGTH
Up to 9 in (23 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
10–65 ft (3–20 m) DISTRIBUTION
Coral reefs in Red Sea and Gulf
of Aden
Ring-tailed Cardinalfish Apogon aureus LENGTH
Up to 6 in (15 cm)
DEPTH
3–130 ft (1–40 m) Red Sea and tropical waters of Indian Ocean and western Pacific DISTRIBUTION
Cardinalfish are small nocturnal reef fish. The ring-tailed cardinalfish hides under corals and in crevices during the day and emerges at night
Queen Angelfish Holacanthus ciliaris
to feed on plankton. It has a distinctive black band around the tail base and two blue and white lines running from the snout through the eyes. Like all of the 200 or so species of cardinalfish, it has two separate dorsal fins. The male does not feed during the breeding season. Instead, after the female has laid her eggs the male broods them in his mouth, protecting them until they hatch.
Butterflyfish provide testimony to the health of a coral reef. A wide variety and plentiful numbers of these brightly colored, disk-shaped fish indicate that a reef is flourishing. Bluecheek butterflyfish are usually seen in pairs and often hide under table corals. The blue eye-patch hides the eye and confuses predators.
Up to 18 in (45 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 31/4 lb (1.5 kg) DEPTH
3–230 ft (1–70 m) Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea, and subtropical waters of western Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
One of the most colorful Caribbean reef fish, the blue and yellow queen angelfish slips its slim body effortlessly between corals and sea fans. It uses its small mouth and brushlike teeth to nibble sponges, which are its main food. Like all angelfish, it has a sharp spine at the corner of the gill cover. Juveniles are brown and yellow with curved blue bars and feed on parasites that they pick from other fish.
OCEAN LIFE
Not recorded
ORDER PERCIFORMES
LENGTH
ORDER PERCIFORMES
WEIGHT
*UVENILEHARLEQUINSWEETLIPSHAVE ADIFFERENTPATTERNINGTHANTHE ADULTS4HEYHAVEBROWNBODIES ANDWHITESPOTSEDGEDINBLACK "YSWIMMINGINAWEAVING UNDULATINGFASHION THESMALLEST JUVENILESMIMICATOXICFLATWORM WITHASIMILARCOLORATIONANDSO ESCAPEPREDATION4HEIRCOLOR MAYALSOWARNTHATTHEY THEMSELVESAREUNPALATABLE TOPREDATORS
364
animal life ORDER PERCIFORMES
Bigeye Trevally Caranx sexfasciatus LENGTH
Up to 4 ft (1.2 m) WEIGHT
Up to 40 lb (18 kg) DEPTH
3–330 ft (1–100 m) DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of Indian Ocean and
Pacific
During the day, shoals of bigeye trevally spiral lazily in coral reef channels and next to steep reef slopes, but at night, these fast-swimming
predators split up and scour the reef for prey. Built for speed, these silvery fish have a narrow tail base, which is reinforced with bony plates called scutes, and a forked caudal fin. The first dorsal fin folds down into a groove to improve the streamlining of the fish, and the pectoral fins are narrow and curved. There are many different species of trevally, which are difficult to tell apart. The bigeye trevally has a relatively large eye and the second dorsal fin usually has a white tip. These fish make good eating and are common in local markets in Southeast Asia. Juvenile bigeye trevally live close inshore and may enter estuaries and rivers.
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Pilotfish Naucrates ductor LENGTH
Up to 28 in (70 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
0–100 ft (0–30 m) Tropical, subtropical, and temperate waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Sharksucker Echeneis naucrates LENGTH
Up to 3 ft (1 m) WEIGHT
Up to 5 lb (2.5 kg) DEPTH
65–165 ft (20–50 m) Tropical, subtropical, and temperate waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
Although a member of the predatory trevally family Carangidae (see left), the pilotfish has taken up a scavenging, nomadic existence, traveling with large, ocean-dwelling bony fish, sharks, rays, and turtles. Its slim, silvery to pale bluish body is marked with six or seven bold black bands. These may help the host fish recognize it and so leave it alone. Darting in when its host has made a kill, the pilotfish eats any scraps it can find and also removes parasites.Young fish associate with jellyfish. The distinctive feature of the sharksucker is the powerful sucker disk on the top of its head, which enables it to attach itself securely to another fish. It feeds on its host’s scraps and parasites, and also on small fish. Usually found attached to sharks or other large fish, cetaceans, and turtles, the sharksucker also swims freely over coral reefs. Its body is long and thin and ends in a fanlike tail.
ridged oval sucker disk replaces first dorsal fin
lower jaw juts out beyond upper jaw
ORDER PERCIFORMES
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Dolphinfish
Sergeant Major
Coryphaena hippurus
Abudefduf saxatilis
LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 7 ft (2.1 m)
Up to 9 in (23 cm)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Up to 88 lb (40 kg)
Up to 7 oz (200 g)
DEPTH
DEPTH
0–280 ft (0–85 m)
3–50 ft (1–15 m)
Tropical, subtropical, and temperate waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
With its shimmering colors, a dolphinfish leaping clear of the water is a spectacular sight. Metallic blues and greens cover its back and sides, grading into white and yellow on the underside. A fast ocean-dwelling fish, it is powered by a long, forked tail, with a single elongated dorsal fin providing stability. Also known as the dorado, it is a valuable market fish.
This small fish is a familiar sight on most coral reefs in the Atlantic. It is one of the most common members of the damselfish family (Pomacentridae). It feeds on zooplankton in large groups, gathering above the reef to pick tiny animals and fish eggs from the water. In tourist areas, the fish are attracted to divers and boats, and will eat almost anything that is offered. Male sergeant majors prepare a nesting area and guard the eggs laid by the females. A similar species, Abudefduf vaigiensis, is found on reefs in the Indo-Pacific region.
DISTRIBUTION
Atlantic Ocean
ORDER PERCIFORMES
False Clown Anemonefish Amphiprion ocellaris LENGTH
Up to 4 in (11 cm) WEIGHT
OCEAN LIFE
Tropical and subtropical waters of
Not recorded DEPTH
3–50 ft (1–15 m) Tropical waters of eastern Indian Ocean and western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
The most surprising thing about the false clown anemonefish is its home. It lives inside a giant stinging anemone. This small orange and white fish
spends its whole life with its chosen anemone, which can be one of three species. At night, it sleeps among the bases of the tentacles on the anemone’s disk. The fish is not stung and eaten because the anemone does not know it is there: a special slime covers the fish’s body and prevents the anemone from recognizing it as food. Each anemone usually supports a large female, her smaller male partner, and several immature fish. If the female dies, the male changes sex and becomes female and the largest immature fish takes on the male role. Both the false clown and the clown anemonefish are among the most popular aquarium fish, and numbers have been reduced in some areas by overcollecting.
bony fishes ORDER PERCIFORMES
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Cuckoo Wrasse
Cleaner Wrasse
Labrus mixtus
Labroides dimidiatus LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 16 in (40 cm)
51/2 in (14 cm)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Not recorded
Not recorded
DEPTH
DEPTH
7–650 ft (2–200 m) Temperate and subtropical waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean DISTRIBUTION
The cuckoo wrasse is one of the most colorful fish in northern European waters. Large mature males (shown here) are a beautiful blue and orange, while females are pink with alternate black and white patches along the back. When they are 7–13 years old, some females change color and sex
and become fully functional males. These males are known as secondary males and spawn in pairs with females. The male excavates a nest and attracts the female with an elaborate swimming display. To further complicate matters, it has been found that a very few fish are born male but have the female coloring. These males are known as primary males and their role in reproduction has not been fully ascertained.
3–130 ft (1–40 m) Tropical reefs in Indian Ocean and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
365
-545!,"%.%&)4 3KINPARASITESAREIRRITATINGAND FISHCANBEDEBILITATEDBYAHEAVY INFESTATION/NCORALREEFS LARGE FISHLINEUPATKNOWNªCLEANING STATIONS«SUCHASAPROMINENT CORALHEAD SPREADTHEIRFINS AND OPENTHEIRMOUTHS4HERESIDENT CLEANERWRASSEPICKSOFFPARASITES ANDDEADTISSUEANDGETSAGOOD MEALINRETURN
The cleaner wrasse spends its life grooming other fish, turtles, and occasionally even divers. This little fish is silvery blue with a black band running from snout to tail. The “client” recognizes it from its markings and does not try to eat it. Groups of cleaner wrasse usually consist of an adult male and a harem of females. If the male dies, the largest female changes sex and takes on the male role, becoming fully functional within a few days. distinctive black band
small mouth with strong teeth
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Green Humphead Parrotfish Bolbometopon muricatum LENGTH
Up to 41/4 ft (1.3 m) WEIGHT
Up to 100 lb (45 kg) DEPTH
3–100 ft (1–30 m) Tropical reefs in Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Blackfin Icefish Chaenocephalus aceratus LENGTH
Up to 28 in (72 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 7½ lb (3.5 kg) ORDER PERCIFORMES
Wolf-fish Anarhichas lupus LENGTH
Up to 5 ft (1.5 m) WEIGHT
Up to 53 lb (24 kg) 3–1,650 ft (1–500 m) DISTRIBUTION
North Atlantic and Arctic Ocean
This large and ferocious-looking fish is normally found on rocky reefs in deep water. However, north of the British Isles, divers regularly see them in shallow water. They are not aggressive to divers unless provoked.
DEPTH
16–2,500 ft (5–770 m) Polar waters of Southern Ocean around northern Antarctica
DISTRIBUTION
In the freezing waters around Antarctica, the temperature can fall to nearly 28˚F (–2˚C). This is below the temperature at which the blood of most fish would freeze. The blackfin icefish has a natural antifreeze in its blood that helps it survive in these conditions. It has no red blood cells and so appears a ghostly white. This makes its blood thinner so that it can flow freely in the cold temperatures. It is a sluggish hunter of small fish and krill and needs little oxygen.
OCEAN LIFE
DEPTH
The wolf-fish has a long body and a huge head with strong caninelike teeth at the front and molarlike teeth at the sides. These are used to break open hard-shelled invertebrates such as mussels, crabs, and sea urchins. Worn teeth are replaced each year. The skin is tough, leathery, and wrinkled and is usually grayish with darker vertical bands extending down the sides. Spawning takes place during the winter. The female lays thousands of yellowish eggs in round clumps among rocks and seaweeds and the male guards them until they hatch. In spite of their unattractive appearance, wolf-fish are good to eat and are caught by anglers. They are also sometimes caught in trawl nets.
Parrotfish are aptly named—not only are they brightly colored, but their teeth are fused together to form a parrotlike beak. The green humphead parrotfish is much larger than most of its relatives. It has a huge crest-shaped hump on its head, a greenish body, large scales, and a single long dorsal fin. This destructive fish feeds by crunching up live coral, and it often breaks up the coral with its head. However, on the positive side, the coral sand it defecates after a meal helps to consolidate the reef and build up patches of sand.
BIGEYE TREVALLIES
These bigeye trevallies, also known as bigeye jacks, are shoaling in shallow water near the Solomon Islands in the western Pacific. They are usually slow-moving by day, but at night the shoals disperse and they hunt singly, moving quickly in search of the fish and crustaceans on which they feed.
368
animal life ORDER PERCIFORMES
Common Stargazer Kathetostoma laeve LENGTH
Up to 30 in
(75 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded
200 ft (0–60 m), possibly 550 ft (150 m)
DEPTH
Temperate waters of Indian Ocean around southern Australia
DISTRIBUTION
Looking like a cross between a bulldog and a seal, the common stargazer normally lies buried in shelly sand. It has its eyes set right on top of its
large, square head and its mouth slants obliquely upward. This allows it to breathe and to see while remaining almost completely buried and is probably the reason behind its unusual name. Its large, white-edged pectoral fins help it to lunge out of the sand and engulf passing fish and crustaceans. Common stargazers have also occasionally bitten divers who have inadvertently disturbed them while on night dives, when they are particularly difficult to spot. Anglers face a greater threat if they catch a common stargazer. Careless handling can result in a painful sting from a tough, venomous spine that lies behind each gill cover.
ORDER PERCIFORMES
broad caudal fin
Tompot Blenny
ORDER PERCIFORMES
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Greater Weever
Sand Eel
Trachinus draco
Ammodytes tobianus LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 20 in (50 cm)
Up to 8 in (20 cm)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Up to
41/2
Not recorded
lb (2 kg)
DEPTH
DEPTH
3–500 ft (1–150 m)
0–100 ft (0–30 m)
DISTRIBUTION
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
The greater weever is one of very few venomous fish found in European waters. It has a long body, large eyes, and two dorsal fins, the first of which has venomous spines. During the day, the fish lies buried in the sand with just its eyes and fin-tip exposed. A painful wound can result from stepping on the fish in shallow water.
Shimmering shoals of sand eels are a familiar sight in shallow sandy bays around northern Europe. These small, silvery fish have long, thin bodies with a pointed jaw and a single long dorsal fin. Large shoals patrol the waters just above the seabed, feeding on planktonic crustaceans, tiny fish, and worms. If threatened, they dive down and disappear into the sand. In winter, they spend most of the time buried. Sand eels form a very important part of the diet of larger fish such as cod, herring, and mackerel, and of sea birds, especially Atlantic puffins. When sand eels are scarce, local puffin colonies produce very few young. In some areas, overexploitation of sand eels for processing into fishmeal has been linked to seabird declines (see p.403).
large eye
Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic and Baltic Sea
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Bignose Unicornfish
Parablennius gattorugine
Naso vlamingii
LENGTH
LENGTH
Up to 12 in (30 cm)
Up to 24 in (60 cm)
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Not recorded
Not recorded
DEPTH
DEPTH
3–100 ft (1–30 m)
3–165 ft (1–50 m)
Temperate and subtropical waters of northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
With its thick lips, bulging eyes, and a pair of tufted head tentacles, the tompot blenny is a comical-looking fish. Like all blennies, it has a long body, a single long dorsal fin, and peglike pelvic fins, which it uses to prop itself up. Inquisitive by nature, the tompot blenny will peer out at approaching divers from the safety of a rock crevice.
large pelvic fins
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Mandarinfish Synchiropus splendidus LENGTH
Up to 21/2 in (6 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
3–60 ft (1–18 m) DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters of southwestern
Pacific
ORDER PERCIFORMES
OCEAN LIFE
Yellow Shrimp Goby Cryptocentrus cinctus LENGTH
Up to 3 in (8 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
3–50 ft (1–15 m) Tropical waters of northeastern Indian Ocean and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
With its yellow and orange body and distinctive green and blue markings, the mandarinfish is one of the most colorful of all reef fish. Its skin is covered with a distasteful slime and its bright colors warn predators not to touch it. Small groups live inshore on silt-covered seabeds among coral and rubble. Most members of the dragonet family (Callionymidae), to which it belongs, are colored to match their surroundings. It is a popular aquarium fish but is very difficult to maintain. Shrimp gobies share their sandy burrows with snapping shrimp belonging to the genus Alpheus. The shrimp have strong claws and excavate and maintain the burrow, while the gobies have good eyesight and act as a lookout at its entrance. The yellow shrimp goby has bulging, high-set eyes, thick lips, and two dorsal fins. Although the usual coloration is yellow with faint, dusky bands, it can also be grayish white. This species lives in sandy areas of shallow lagoons and bays.
Tropical waters of Indian Ocean and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Unicornfish are so called because many have a hornlike projection on their forehead. However, the bignose unicornfish just has a rounded bulbous snout. At the base of the tail are two pairs of fixed, bony plates that stick out sideways like sharp knives, and the fish can inflict a serious wound on a potential predator. These blades are characteristic of surgeonfish (Acanthuridae), the family to which unicornfish belong. Usually dark with blue streaks, the bignose unicornfish can pale instantly to a silvery gray. This often happens when the fish is being cleaned by a cleaner wrasse (see p.365). It favors steep reef slopes where it can feed on zooplankton in the open water.
bony fishes
369
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Great Barracuda Sphyraena barracuda LENGTH
Up to 61/2 ft (2 m) WEIGHT
Up to 110 lb (50 kg) DEPTH
0–330 ft (0–100 m) DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and subtropical waters
worldwide
Barracuda are fast-moving predators with needle-sharp teeth and an undeserved reputation for ferocity. The great barracuda has a long, streamlined body with the second dorsal fin set far back near the tail. This fin arrangement, along with a large, powerful tail, allows it to stalk its prey and then accelerate forward at great speed. Large individuals in frequently dived sites will often allow divers to approach closely. Very occasionally a lone fish may attack a diver if it mistakes a hand or shiny watch for a silvery fish. Eating even small amounts of barracuda can result in ciguatera poisoning, caused by toxins accumulated from its food. GREAT BARRACUDA SKULL
Barracuda have flat-topped, elongated skulls with large, powerful jaws and knifelike teeth.
BARRACUDA SHOAL
While adults are normally solitary, juvenile great barracuda often swim together in large shoals in sheltered areas for protection.
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Atlantic Mackerel Scomber scombrus LENGTH
Up to 24 in (60 cm)
long front teeth
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Northern Bluefin Tuna Thunnus thynnus LENGTH
WEIGHT
Up to 15 ft (4.5 m)
Up to 71/2 lb (3.5 kg)
WEIGHT
DEPTH
Up to 2,230 lb (680 kg)
0–650 ft (0–200 m)
DEPTH
Temperate waters of north Atlantic, Mediterranean, and Black Sea DISTRIBUTION
0–9,900 ft (0–3,000 m) Northern and central Atlantic and Mediterranean
swimming and is one of the fastest bony fish, attaining speeds of at least 43 mph (70 km/h). The pectoral, pelvic, and first dorsal fins can be slotted into grooves to further streamline the torpedo-shaped body. To provide for long-distance, sustained swimming, the fish has large amounts of red muscle, which has a high fat content and can store oxygen. Other, similar species of bluefin tuna occur in the Pacific Ocean and southern parts of the Atlantic Ocean.
ORDER PERCIFORMES
Atlantic Sailfish Istiophorus albicans LENGTH
Up to 10 ft (3.2 m) WEIGHT
Up to 130 lb (60 kg) DEPTH
0–650 ft (0–200 m) Temperate and tropical waters of Atlantic and Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
DISTRIBUTION
dark lines on back
The northern bluefin tuna is one of the world’s most valuable commercial fish and is heavily overexploited. Like mackerel, it is designed for high-speed silvery belly
OCEAN LIFE
The Atlantic mackerel is designed for fast swimming. It has a torpedo-shaped, streamlined body, small dorsal fins, close-fitting gill covers, and small, smooth scales. In the summer, large shoals feed close inshore, voraciously preying on small fish and straining plankton with their gills. From March to June, they lay their floating eggs in habitual spawning areas, the eggs hatching after a few days. In winter, the fish move into deeper water offshore and hardly feed. Several separate stocks exist within the north Atlantic, all of which are commercially exploited.
Like swordfish and marlin, the Atlantic sailfish has its upper jaw extended into a long spear. This is used to slash through shoals of fish, stunning and maiming them. It has a huge sail-like dorsal fin, which is used in displays, but is folded away for fast swimming. A similar sailfish occurs in the Pacific and may be the same species.
370
animal life ORDER PLEURONECTIFORMES
European Plaice Pleuronectes platessa LENGTH
Up to 3 ft (1 m) WEIGHT
Up to 15 lb (7 kg) DEPTH
0–655 ft (0–200 m) Arctic Ocean, northeastern Atlantic, Mediterranean, and Black Sea
DISTRIBUTION
This species is the most important commercial flatfish for European fisheries. Heavy fishing, however, has resulted in a progressive reduction in
ORDER PLEURONECTIFORMES
Common Sole Solea solea LENGTH
Up to 28 in (70 cm) WEIGHT
the size and age of fish landed. It is a typical oval-shaped flatfish with long fins extending along both edges of its thin body. Flatfish have both eyes on one side of their body and are either “right-eyed” or “left-eyed.” Plaice are right-eyed: they lie on the sea bed with their left side down. Their upward-facing right side is brown with orange or red spots. Plaice spend the day buried in the sand, emerging at night to feed on shellfish and crustaceans, which they crush using special teeth in the throat (pharyngeal teeth).Young plaice are also expert at nipping off the breathing siphons of shellfish that they spot sticking up out of the sand. flatfish, the common sole starts life as a tiny larval fish floating near the surface. As it grows, it gradually undergoes a radical metamorphosis. The eye on the left side moves around the head to join the eye on the right and the body starts to flatten. When it is about a month old, it settles on the
ORDER TETRADONTIFORMES
Scrawled Filefish Aluterus scriptus LENGTH
Up to 31/2 ft
(1.1 m) WEIGHT
Up to 51/2 lb
(2.5 kg) 6–400 ft (2–120 m)
DEPTH
Tropical and subtropical waters of Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans
DISTRIBUTION
sea floor with its eyeless side facing down. The skin on the underside stays white but the upper side develops pigment. Although common sole can live to be nearly 30 years old, they are a valuable food fish and most are caught when only a few years old.
Beautiful blue, irregular markings like a child’s scribbles give this reef fish its name. Filefish are closely related to triggerfish (see below, left), but are thinner and, except for the scrawled filefish, usually smaller. This large species has one large and one tiny spine on its back over the eyes. The fish uses these spines to help wedge itself into crevices for safety.
Up to 61/2 lb (3 kg) DEPTH
0–500 ft (0–150 m) Temperate waters of northeastern Atlantic, Baltic, Mediterranean, and Black seas
DISTRIBUTION
Common sole are masters of camouflage and can subtly alter their color to match the sea bed on which they lie. The basic grayish brown color can be lightened or darkened and the pattern of darker splotches changed. Sole have a rounded snout and a semicircular mouth and their head is fringed with short filaments, giving them an unshaven appearance. Like all
ORDER TETRADONTIFORMES
Spotted Boxfish Ostracion meleagris LENGTH
Up to 10 in (25 cm) ORDER TETRADONTIFORMES
Titan Triggerfish Balistoides viridescens LENGTH
Up to 30 in (75 cm) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
3–160 ft (1–50 m) Tropical reefs of Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and southwestern Pacific
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
The titan triggerfish is also known as the mustache triggerfish due to a dark line above its lips. It has large, strong front teeth and strong spines in its first dorsal fin. The first and longer spine can be locked in an upright position and released by depressing the second smaller “trigger” spine. This allows the fish to jam itself into a reef crevice, where it can rest safely, away from potential predators. The titan triggerfish preys on shellfish and crustaceans, which it crunches up
using its tough mouth and teeth. It can even make a meal of sea urchins by flipping them over and biting them on their vulnerable underside, where the spines are shorter.
WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
3–100 ft (1–30 m) DISTRIBUTION Tropical reefs in Indian Ocean and South pacific, possibly extending to Mexico
02/4%#4)6% 0!2%.4 )NTHEBREEDINGSEASON TITAN TRIGGERFISHDIGANESTINASANDY PATCHOFCORALRUBBLEUSING THEIRMOUTHASAWATERJET 4HEFEMALELAYSHEREGGS INTHENESTANDONEOR BOTHOFTHEPARENTS REMAINSNEARBYTOGUARDIT .ORMALLYAWARYFISH PARENT TITANTRIGGERFISHWILLATTACKDIVERS THATCOMETOOCLOSE TOTHENESTANDCANINFLICT SEVEREBITESTHATNEED MEDICALATTENTION
Instead of a covering of scales, all boxfish are protected by a rigid box of fused bony plates under the skin. This means they cannot bend their body and must swim by beating their pectoral fins. A large tail gives some propulsion and is also used to help steer them like a rudder. Male spotted boxfish are more colorful than the females, which are brown with light spots. These fish secrete a poisonous slime from their skin that protects them from predators.
bony fishes ORDER TETRADONTIFORMES
Ocean Sunfish Mola mola LENGTH
Up to 13 ft (4 m) WEIGHT
Up to 5,000 lb (2,300 kg) DEPTH
0–1,600 ft (0–480 m) Tropical, subtropical, and temperate waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER TETRADONTIFORMES
Star Pufferfish Arothron stellatus LENGTH
Up to 4 ft (1.2 m) WEIGHT
Not recorded DEPTH
10–200 ft (3–60 m) DISTRIBUTION
Tropical reefs in Indian Ocean and
south Pacific
Compared with most other pufferfish, the star pufferfish is a relative giant. Its black-spotted skin is covered in small prickles and, if threatened, it will swallow water and swell up to an even larger size. At night, it searches out hard-shelled reef invertebrates and crushes them with powerful jaws that have fused, beaklike teeth.
ORDER TETRADONTIFORMES
Porcupinefish Diodon histrix LENGTH
Up to 35 in (90 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 61/2 lb (3 kg) DEPTH
6–160 ft (2–50 m) Tropical and subtropical waters of Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans DISTRIBUTION
HUMAN IMPACT
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The ocean sunfish is the world’s heaviest bony fish and has a distinctive disklike shape. Instead of a caudal fin, it has a rudderlike structure (clavus) formed by extensions of the dorsal and anal fin rays, and it swims by flapping its tall dorsal and anal fins
371
from side to side. Its common name comes from the fish’s habit of drifting in surface currents while lying on its side. It also swims upright with its dorsal fin sticking above the surface. The ocean sunfish has no scales, but its skin is very thick and stretchy. Like the porcupinefish (see below, left), to which it is related, the ocean sunfish has a single fused tooth-plate in each jaw, but it feeds mainly on soft-bodied jellyfish and other slow-moving invertebrates and fish. Females produce the most eggs of any bony fish, laying up to 100 million in the open ocean. Lone fish make grating noises with pharyngeal (throat) teeth, and this may help them to make contact with potential mates.
When a porcupinefish is frightened, it pumps water into its body until it looks like a prickly soccer ball. Few predators are large enough or brave enough to swallow a fish in this state. Left to itself, the porcupinefish deflates and its long spines lie flat against its body. During the day, it hides in caves and reef crevices, emerging at night to feed on hard-shelled invertebrates such as gastropod mollusks. prominent eye
OCEAN LIFE
erect spine
372
animal life
REPTILES
HUMAN IMPACT
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DURING THE JURASSIC PERIOD, over
140 million years ago, reptiles were the largest animals in the oceans. Their place has since been taken by mammals, leaving few reptiles that are wholly marine. Of these, turtles are the most widespread, and sea snakes are the most diverse. Apart from the leatherback turtle, almost all are confined to warm-water regions, with the largest numbers around coasts and on coral reefs.
DOMAIN Eucarya KINGDOM Animalia PHYLUM Chordata CLASS Reptilia ORDERS 4 SPECIES About 7,700
!LLMARINEREPTILES APARTFROMSEA SNAKES HAVEALONGHISTORYOF EXPLOITATIONBYHUMANSFORFOOD SKINS ORSHELLS4URTLESFACETHE ADDITIONALHAZARDOFBEING ACCIDENTALLYCAUGHTINFISHING NETS ANDNUMBERSOFALLSEVEN SPECIESHAVESTEEPLYDECLINED -ARINETURTLESARENOWPROTECTED BYINTERNATIONALLEGISLATION ILLEGAL SOUVENIRS
ANATOMY
pointed scales (scutes)
Marine reptiles have several adaptations for life in the sea. Turtles have a low, streamlined shell, or carapace, and broad, flattened forelimbs that beat up and down like head wings. Marine lizards and crocodiles use their tails to provide most of the power when swimming, while most sea snakes have flattened tails that work like oars. Unlike land snakes, true sea snakes do not have enlarged belly scales, since they do not need good traction for crawling on land. All reptiles breathe air, and marine species have valves or flaps that prevent water entering their nostrils when they dive. Crocodiles also have a valve at the top of the throat, which enables them to open their mouths beneath the surface without flooding their lungs with water. Marine reptiles all need to expel excess salt. Sea snakes and crocodiles do this through salt glands in their mouths, while marine turtles lose salt in their tears. The marine iguana has salt glands located on its nose.
streamlined shell (carapace)
Stuffed marine turtles—seen here on a beach in Peru—are still sold to tourists, despite being liable to seizure by customs officials. .
short rear flippers long front flippers
STREAMLINED SHELL
The hawksbill turtle has a tapering carapace with conspicuous scales, or scutes. Unlike most terrestrial tortoises, it cannot retract its head or legs inside its shell.
FOOD AND FEEDING REPLACEMENT TEETH
A saltwater crocodile’s teeth are constantly shed and replaced. During its lifetime, it may use over 40 sets.
HABITAT Most marine reptiles live close to the shore, or return to it to breed. The only fully pelagic species are true sea snakes—those in the family Hydrophiidae. They remain in the open ocean for their entire lives. Sea snakes are also the deepest divers, feeding up to 330 ft (100 m) below the surface. Apart from the leatherback turtle, most marine reptiles depend on external warmth to remain active, which restricts them to tropical and subtropical waters. They also show striking variations in regional spread. This is particularly true of sea snakes: up to 25 species are found in some parts of the Indo-Pacific, but the Atlantic Ocean has none.
KEY
AT L A
Number of sea snake species
N
T
12–25 species I
C
PACI FI C
OC
OCEAN
2–12 species
EAN
I N DI AN
OCEAN LIFE
OCE AN S OU T
1 species
Most marine reptiles are carnivorous. Sea snakes typically feed on fish, although a few are specialized predators of fish eggs. They use their venom mainly in feeding, rather than for defense, killing their prey by biting it, and then swallowing it whole. Green turtles feed on seagrass when they become adult, while other marine turtles are carnivorous throughout their lives. The marine iguana is the only marine reptile that is a fully herbivorous. When young, it feeds on algae close to the waterline, but as an adult, it grazes seaweed growing on submerged rocks. Reptiles are coldblooded (ectothermic), so they use less energy than mammals or birds. This means that they need less food, and can go for long periods between meals. Sea snakes, for example, can survive on just one or two meals a month.
HERN OCEAN
SEA SNAKES WORLDWIDE
REEF SNAKE
Although diverse in the IndoPacific, sea snakes are absent from the Atlantic. Cold waters off southern Africa prevent them from spreading west.
A yellow-lipped sea krait searches for prey in a coral reef. Reefs are prime habitats for sea kraits, which generally live in shallow water.
GRAZING ON ALGAE
Marine iguanas have blunter heads than most lizards, enabling them to tear seaweed from rocks. Sharp claws act as anchors.
reptiles
REPRODUCTION
373
REPTILE CLASSIFICATION
True sea snakes are the only reptiles that reproduce at sea. They give birth to live young (they are viviparous) after a gestation period of up to 11 months – much longer than most terrestrial species. All other marine reptiles, including sea kraits and marine turtles, lay their eggs on land. Many of these animals breed on remote beaches and islands, and the adults sometimes arrive simultaneously and in large numbers. The eggs are incubated by ambient warmth, and in crocodiles and turtles, the nest temperature determines the sex ratio of the hatchlings. Once the eggs have hatched, growth is fast, but mortality can be high. Parental care is rare in marine reptiles; female crocodiles are an exception, guarding their nests and carrying their young to water after they have hatched.
Three orders of living reptiles contain marine species. The fourth order includes only the tuataras, which are terrestrial. Snakes make up the vast majority of marine reptiles. Others, such as wart snakes and terrapins, live in fresh water, occasionally entering the sea. TURTLES AND TORTOISES Order Chelonia About 300 species
Seven turtle species are exclusively marine. Typical marine turtles (six species) have a hard carapace. The separately classified leatherback turtle has a rubbery carapace. SNAKES AND LIZARDS Order Squamata About 7,400 species
About 70 species of snakes live in salt water. True sea snakes, belonging to the
family Hydrophiidae, spend all their lives at sea, while sea kraits (members of the Elapidae) breed on land. Seagoing lizards are all semiterrestrial; only one species, the marine iguana, gets all its food offshore. CROCODILES AND ALLIGATORS Order Crocodilia 23 species
Only the American crocodile and the saltwater crocodile live in both fresh water and the sea. Crocodilians usually feed at the surface, rarely diving more than a few yards when at sea.
NEST IN THE SAND
After excavating a nest, a female leatherback lays her eggs. Turtle eggs are almost spherical, and have soft, leathery shells, which tear open when they hatch.
MARINE ADAPTATIONS
Thanks to their low metabolic rate, marine reptiles can remain underwater for long periods. This young saltwater crocodile is lurking on the seabed off New Guinea.
OCEAN LIFE
374
animal life ORDER CHELONIA
Green Turtle Chelonia mydas 21/2 –31/4 ft (0.8–1 m)
LENGTH
140–290 lb (65–130 kg)
WEIGHT
Open sea, coral reefs, coasts
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and temperate waters
worldwide
Elegantly marked and very effectively streamlined, this species is the most common turtle in subtropical and tropical waters, where it is often seen in eelgrass beds and on coral reefs.
ORDER CHELONIA
Hawksbill Turtle Eretmochelys imbricata 21/2 –31/4 ft (0.8–1 m)
LENGTH
100–165 lb (45–75 kg)
WEIGHT
Coral reefs and coastal shallows
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
worldwide
Tropical and warm-temperate waters
Its color varies from green to dark brown, but its scales and shell plates (scutes) are lighter where they meet, giving it a distinctive, checkered pattern. Like all marine turtles, it has front flippers that are long and broad and beat up and down like wings. They provide the power for swimming, while the much shorter rear flippers act as stabilizers.Young green turtles are carnivorous, eating mollusks and other small animals, but the adults feed mainly on eelgrass and algae—a diet that keeps them close to the coast. Green turtles breed on isolated beaches, and they are remarkably faithful to their nesting sites. To reach them, some make journeys of more than 600 miles (1,000 km), navigating
their way to remote islands that may be just a few miles across. They mate in the shallows, and the females then crawl ashore after dark to dig their nests and lay eggs. Green turtles lay up to 200 eggs, burying them about 30 in (75 cm) beneath the sand. The eggs take about 6–8 weeks to hatch. All the young emerge simultaneously and scuttle for the safety of the waves. The green turtle has been hunted for centuries, mainly for food, and its numbers have declined significantly. Conservation measures include protection of the turtles’ nest sites, so that the young have a better chance of reaching the sea.
Named after its conspicuous beaked snout, the hawksbill has a carapace with a raised, central keel and pointed shell plates (scutes) around its rear margin. It lives in warm-water regions, feeding on sponges, mollusks, and other sedentary animals, and rarely strays far from shallows and coral reefs. It is less migratory than other marine turtles, breeding at low densities all over the tropics instead of gathering at certain beaches. On land, it has a distinctive gait, moving its flippers
in diagonally opposite pairs—other marine turtles move their front flippers together—the same action they use when swimming. The hawksbill is the chief source of tortoiseshell—detached, polished scutes. Despite being classified as Critically Endangered by the IUCN, hawksbills are often killed and stuffed when young to be sold as curios, particularly in Southeast Asia. Attempts at farming these turtles have not been successful.
%!2,9,)&% !FTERHATCHINGWHILEBURIEDIN THESAND THEYOUNGTURTLESUSE THEIRFRONTFLIPPERSTODIGTOWARD THESURFACE4HEYTHENMAKEA DASHFORTHESEA TRYINGTOAVOID BECOMINGAMEALFORWAITING PREDATORS INCLUDINGBIRDS CRABS SNAKES ANDANTS6ERYLITTLEIS KNOWNABOUTTHEIREARLYLIFE AS YOUNGGREENTURTLESARERARELY OBSERVEDINTHEWILD BUTITIS CERTAINTHATTHEYFACEMANY PREDATORSINTHESEA4HEIR GROWTHRATEISKNOWNTOAVERAGE MORETHANLBKG PERYEAR
ORDER CHELONIA
Loggerhead Turtle Caretta caretta 21/4 –31/4 ft (0.7–1 m)
LENGTH
165–350 lb (75–160 kg)
WEIGHT
Open sea, coral reefs, coasts
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and warm temperate waters
worldwide
OCEAN LIFE
After the leatherback (opposite), the loggerhead is the second-largest marine turtle. It has a blunt head, powerful jaws, and a steeply domed carapace. It hunts and eats hard-bodied animals, such as crabs, lobsters, and clams. This species takes about 30 years to mature and breeds every other year.
reptiles ORDER CHELONIA
Leatherback Turtle Dermochelys coriacea 41/4 –6 ft (1.3–1.8 m)
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Up to 2,000 lb
(900 kg) HABITAT
Leatherbacks breed mainly in the tropics, on steeply sloping sandy beaches, laying up to nine clutches of eggs in each breeding season. Unusually for a reptile, the leatherback turtle can keep its body warmer than its surroundings, thanks partly to the thick layer of insulating fat beneath its skin. This
allows it to wander much more widely than other turtles, reaching as far north as Iceland and almost as far south as Cape Horn. Individuals may roam huge distances—one leatherback tagged off the coast of South America was later found on the other side of the Atlantic, 4,200 miles (6,800 km) away.
Open sea
Tropical, subtropical, and temperate waters worldwide DISTRIBUTION
carapace with parallel ridges
large head on short neck
Kemp’s Ridley Turtle Lepidochelys kempi 20–35 in (50–90 cm) LENGTH
55–90 lb (25–40 kg)
WEIGHT
HABITAT
Coral reefs,
coasts DISTRIBUTION Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico, occasionally as far north as New England
Also known as the Atlantic Ridley turtle, this is the smallest marine turtle, and also the most threatened, largely as a result of its unusual
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The leatherback’s throat spines can be over 1/2 in (1 cm) long. They are regularly replaced during the animal’s life.
The leatherback is the world’s largest marine turtle. Its carapace has a rubbery texture, having no hard plates, and has a tapering, pearlike shape. Its head is not retractable, and the leatherback is unique among turtles in having flippers without claws. It spends most of its life in the open sea, returning to the coast only when it breeds. It feeds on jellyfish and other planktonic animals, and while it gets most of its food near the surface, it can dive to depths of 3,300 ft (1,000 m).
ORDER CHELONIA
375
breeding behavior. Unlike most marine turtles, Kemp’s Ridleys lay their eggs by day, and the females crawl out of the sea simultaneously, during mass nestings called arribadas (Spanish for “arrivals”). At one time, these nestings took place throughout the turtle’s range, but because the eggs were laid in such large concentrations in daylight, they were easy prey for human egg-harvesters and natural predators. Today, the vast majority of Kemp’s Ridleys breed on a single beach in Mexico, where their nests are protected. These turtles were also often caught as bycatch in shrimp nets, but turtle excluding devices (TEDs) fitted to nets have helped to reduce
this threat. Several weeks after an arribada, young Kemp’s Ridleys emerge from their eggs in the thousands to make the dangerous journey down the beach and into the relative safety of the sea. The adults are carnivorous bottomfeeders that mainly hunt crabs. They have an unusually broad carapace, and their small size makes them agile swimmers. The carapace changes color with age: yearlings are often almost black, while adults are light olive-gray. A closely related species, the olive Ridley turtle (L. olivacea), lives throughout the tropics. It is much less endangered than the Kemp’s Ridley, thanks to its wider distribution.
ORDER CHELONIA
Flatback Turtle Natator depressus 31/4 –4 ft (1–1.2 m)
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Up to 190 lb
(85 kg) HABITAT
Coasts,
shallows North and northeastern Australia, New Guinea, Arafura Sea
DISTRIBUTION
Named after its carapace, which is only slightly domed, the flatback has the most restricted distribution of any marine turtle. It lives in shallow waters between northern Australia and New Guinea, reaching south along the Great Barrier Reef. When adult, it is largely carnivorous, feeding on fish and bottom-dwelling animals such as mollusks and sea squirts. Despite their restricted range, adult flatbacks may swim over 600 miles (1,000 km) to reach nesting beaches. Females dig an average of three nests each time they breed and lay a total of about 150 eggs. The young feed at the surface on planktonic animals. Instead of dispersing into deep oceanic water, like the young of other turtle species, they remain in the shallows over the continental shelf.
OCEAN LIFE
HAWKSBILL TURTLE
This turtle owes its common name to its sharp, powerful beak, shaped like that of a bird of prey. The specimen photographed here, on a reef in the southern Red Sea, is holding a piece of soft coral, but its jaws are strong enough to detach even hard corals. It has two claws on each flipper.
378
animal life ORDER SQUAMATA
Yellow-lipped Sea Krait Laticauda colubrina LENGTH
31/4–10 ft
(1–3 m) WEIGHT
Up to 11 lb (5 kg)
Coral reefs, mangrove swamps, estuaries
HABITAT
Eastern Indian Ocean and southwestern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This species is the most widespread of the sea kraits—a group of four closely related species that lay eggs on land, instead of giving birth at sea.
It has a pale blue body, marked with eye-catching dark blue rings, and distinctive yellow lips, which give it its common name. The yellow-lipped sea krait feeds on fish in shallow water, and although it has highly potent venom, it presents very little danger to humans because it is not aggressive and even when handled it rarely bites. Unlike many other marine snakes, sea kraits have large ventral scales that give them good traction when they crawl, allowing them to move around comfortably on land. During the breeding season, they come ashore in large numbers to mate and lay clutches of up to 20 eggs. Once they have hatched, the young make their way to the shallows, before dispersing along coasts and out to sea.
ORDER SQUAMATA
Yellow-bellied Sea Snake Pelamis platurus 31/4–5 ft (1–1.5 m)
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Up to 3 lb
(1.5 kg) HABITAT
Open water
Tropical and subtropical waters in Indian Ocean and Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
This boldly striped yellow-and-black snake has venom that is more toxic than that of a cobra. It is also the world’s most wide-ranging snake and
ORDER SQUAMATA
Beaked Sea Snake Enhydrina schistosa 31/4–5 ft (1–1.5 m)
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Up to 41/2 lb
(2 kg) Shallow inshore waters
HABITAT
Indian Ocean and western Pacific, from Persian Gulf to northern Australia
DISTRIBUTION
Notoriously aggressive and readily provoked, this widespread species is responsible for nine out of every ten deaths from sea-snake bites. Light gray with indistinct blue-gray bands, it has a sharply pointed head, slender body, HUMAN IMPACT
OCEAN LIFE
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one of the very few that lives in the surface waters of the open ocean. Its distinctive colors warn that it is poisonous, protecting it from many predators. It feeds on small fish trying to shelter in its shade, swimming forward or backward with equal ease to grab them with its jaws. Although its fangs are tiny, its potent venom occasionally causes human fatalities. At sea, these snakes may form vast flotillas hundreds of thousands strong, and after storms, they may be washed up on beaches that lie far outside their normal range. However, the species has never managed to colonize the Atlantic Ocean, because cold currents stand in its way.Yellow-bellied sea snakes give birth to up to six young each time they breed.
and paddlelike tail. Its fangs are less than 1/5 in (4 mm) long, but its jaws can gape widely to accommodate large prey. It feeds mainly on catfish and shrimp. swimming near the bottom in shallow, murky water, in coastal waters, mangrove swamps, estuaries, and rivers, locating its victims by smell and touch. Like all fish-eating snakes, it waits until its prey has stopped struggling, before turning it so that it can be consumed head-first. Beaked sea snakes give birth to up to 30 young each time they breed, but their mortality is high, and only a small proportion of the young survive to become parents themselves. Despite their venom, these snakes are eaten by inshore predators, such as fish and estuarine crocodiles.
379 ORDER SQUAMATA
Turtle-headed Sea Snake Emydocephalus annulatus LENGTH 2–4 ft (60–120 cm) WEIGHT
Up to 3 lb (1.5 kg)
Coral reefs and coral sand banks
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Indian Ocean and Pacific, from northern Australia to Fiji
This Australasian sea snake is highly notable for its color variation, and also for its highly specialized lifestyle as a predator of fish eggs. The color it most commonly takes is a plain blue-gray, which is found throughout its range. A striking ringed form lives in some parts of the Great Barrier Reef, while a rarer, dark or melanistic form is found on isolated reefs farther
east in the Coral Sea. The turtleheaded sea snake moves slowly among living corals, methodically searching for egg masses either glued to the coral’s branches or laid directly on the coral sand. When it finds an egg mass, it scrapes the eggs off with an enlarged scale on its upper jaw, which works like a blade. In most cases, parent fish leave the eggs unguarded, so the snakes can feed unhindered, but some species— such as damselfish—guard their eggs aggressively and try to keep the snakes away. Little is known about this snake’s reproductive habits, apart from the fact that the females give birth to live young. In keeping with their lifestyle, turtle-headed sea snakes have tiny fangs (less than 1/32 in [1 mm] long) and they rarely try to bite. Their venom is one of the weakest of any sea snake, and instead of striking back at predators, they react to danger by disappearing into crevices in the reef.
ORDER SQUAMATA
Olive Sea Snake Aipysurus laevis LENGTH
3–7 ft (1–2.2 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 61/2 lb
(3 kg) Coral reefs, coastal shallows, estuaries
HABITAT
Eastern Indian Ocean and western Pacific, from western Australia to New Caledonia
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER SQUAMATA
Leaf-scaled Sea Snake LENGTH
Up to 2 ft (60 cm)
WEIGHT
Up to 1 lb
(0.5 kg) Coral reefs and coral sand banks
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
reefs)
Timor Sea (Ashmore and Hibernia
OCEAN LIFE
Aipysurus foliosquama
This fish-eating snake has one of the most restricted ranges of any sea snake, being confined to a group of remote coral reefs about 185 miles (300 km) off the northwest coast of Australia. It is marked with contrasting bands or rings and gets its name from the characteristic shape of its dorsal scales. It lives in shallow water and rarely dives deeper than about 33 ft (10 m). Although venomous, it is rarely aggressive. Female leaf-scaled sea snakes are larger than the males and give birth to live young.
Plain brown or olive-brown above, with a paler underside, this common sea snake is one of six closely related species found in the reefs and shallow coastal waters of northern Australasia. Like its relatives, it has a cylindrical body, a flattened tail, and enlarged ventral scales—a feature normally found in snakes that spend some or all of their life on land. However, it is fully aquatic, hunting fish among the crevices and recesses of large corals. Instead of roaming throughout a reef, it often stays in the same small area of coral, rarely venturing into open water except after dark. Olive sea snakes give birth to live young, producing up to five fingersized offspring after a gestation period of nine months. Unlike the adults, the young are dark in color, with a boldly contrasting pattern of lighter bands. This is gradually lost as they become mature. Olive sea snakes are naturally inquisitive and often approach divers. They have short fangs and bite readily if provoked. Their venom is toxic and has been known to be fatal.
380
EQUIPPED TO GRIP
An adult marine iguana sprawls on the sand, displaying the broad feet and long claws it uses to grip submerged rocks while it tears off mouthfuls of food.
ORDER SQUAMATA
Marine Iguana Amblyrhynchus cristatus LENGTH Up to 5 ft (1.5 m), but often smaller
Females 11/8 lb (500 g); males 31/3 lb (1.5 kg), sometimes larger
WEIGHT
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Rocky coasts
Galapagos Islands
Restricted to the Galápagos Islands, this primeval-looking reptile is the only lizard that feeds exclusively at sea once it is an adult. The size and weight of this species varies between islands.
OCEAN LIFE
spiky crest
It has a blunt head with powerful jaws and a distinctive spiky crest that runs down its head, neck, and back. This lizard’s powerful claws help it clamber over rocks, while its tail propels its through water. It feeds on seaweeds and other algae. The young feed above the water, but adults dive to 33 ft (10 m), and can hold their breath for over an hour. During the day, they spend their time feeding and sunbathing to raise their body temperature. During the breeding season, male marine iguanas engage in lengthy headbutting contests as they compete for mates. Females lay up to six eggs in the sand, and the young emerge after an incubation period of up to three months. Marine iguanas have many natural predators, including sharks and birds of prey, and have been severely affected by introduced animals, such as rats and dogs. blunt snout
PROFILE OF A GRAZER
Unlike predatory lizards, the marine iguana has blunt but powerful jaws. It secretes the surplus salt derived from its diet from glands near its nose.
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When it returns to land, the marine iguana sprawls over rocks just above the surf to soak up warmth from the sun through its skin.
reptiles ORDER SQUAMATA
Water Monitor Varanus salvator LENGTH
Up to 9 ft (2.7 m)
WEIGHT
35–75 lb (15–
35 kg) Low-lying coasts, estuaries, rivers
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Indian Ocean, western Pacific, from Sri Lanka to the Philippines and Indonesia
An opportunistic predator with a wide-ranging diet, this is one of the largest lizards that regularly ventures into salt water. It has a long neck, strong legs, and a flattened tail, which lashes from side to side when it swims. It feeds on anything it can overpower, diving to catch prey in the shallows or running it down onshore. Like other monitors, it also feeds on carrion. In some places, it can often be seen on the outskirts of coastal villages, where it scavenges on discarded remains. Water monitors breed by laying eggs, which the female places at the end of a burrow. conspicuous markings when young
ORDER SQUAMATA
Mangrove Monitor Varanus indicus LENGTH
Up to 4 ft (1.2 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 22 lb
(10 kg) Mangrove swamps, coastal forests, estuaries, rivers
HABITAT
water monitor has had human help in expanding its range. In the past, it was introduced by humans throughout the western Pacific as a source of food, and more recently, the species has been introduced into some Pacific islands as a way of controlling rats. Water monitors lay up to a dozen eggs each time they breed and, like most lizards, their young hatch and develop without parental protection.
Western Pacific, from Micronesia to northern Australia
DISTRIBUTION
Similar in shape to the water monitor (left), this lizard has a comparable lifestyle, although it rarely swims far from the shore. Like all monitors, it has a long, supple neck and powerful clawed feet. Its tail is flattened laterally and is double the length of its body. Mangrove monitors are very good swimmers and excellent climbers, hunting on the ground, in shallow water, and in trees. Fish make up a large part of their diet, although they eat a wide range of other food, including crabs, birds, other lizards, and even scavenged fishing bait. The
381
flexible neck longer than head
long, narrow head
ORDER CROCODILIA
American Crocodile Crocodylus acutus LENGTH
Up to 161/2 ft
(5 m) 400–1,000 lb (180–450 kg)
WEIGHT
Estuaries, open sea, coasts, lagoons
HABITAT
Caribbean Sea, adjoining areas of Atlantic, Pacific coast of Central and South America
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN WANDERER
The Saltwater Crocodile is a strong swimmer. It has been seen 600 miles (1,000 km) from the nearest coast.
ORDER CROCODILIA
Saltwater Crocodile Crocodylus porosus LENGTH
Up to 23 ft (7 m)
Up to 2,200 lb (1 metric ton)
WEIGHT
Open sea, rivers, estuaries, coasts
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Indian Ocean, Pacific, from southern India to New Guinea and Australia
tail with vertical scutes
pointed jaws
ARMOR PLATING
body slung between legs
The saltwater crocodile is protected by parallel rows of bony protuberances along its back.
It controls its body temperature by cooling down in water and warming up in the sun. Like other large crocodiles, the saltwater crocodile hunts by stealth, lurking close to the shore, hiding beneath the water with little more than its eyes and nose visible. When an animal comes within range, it bursts out of the water with explosive force, grabs its victim, and then drags it under until it drowns. Crocodiles cannot chew their food— instead, they tear it to pieces, digesting scales, skin, and even bones. Their natural prey includes birds, fish, turtles, and a wide variety of mammals, such as wild boar, monkeys, horses, and water buffalo. Females lay up to 90 eggs in a waterside mound, carrying their young to the water when they hatch. Saltwater crocodiles are hunted in many parts of their range, making large specimens rarer than they once were.
protruding eyes with vertical pupils
powerful jaws
OCEAN LIFE
Also known as the estuarine or IndoPacific crocodile, this formidable predator is the world’s largest reptile, and is also one of the few crocodilians
that frequently swims far out to sea. Its power and ferocity are legendary, and it is thought to be responsible for more than 1,000 human deaths a year. The saltwater crocodile has powerful jaws housing teeth up to 5 in (13 cm) long. Its immensely tough skin is covered with thick scales. The scales on its back are armored with bony deposits called osteoderms, while its tail has a double row of upright bony plates (scutes). Its nostrils close when it dives, but it cannot exclude water from its mouth. Instead, it has a valve at the entrance to its throat, which opens only when it swallows food.
Of the four species of crocodile found in the Americas, this is the only one that—as an adult—is equally at home in both fresh water and the sea. When full-grown, it is olive brown, with a narrow-tipped snout, broad back, and a powerful, tapering tail. Its bony deposits (osteoderms) are smaller than those of other crocodiles. When young, American crocodiles feed on fish and small land animals, but adults often eat turtles, cracking them open in their jaws. Females bury their eggs in sand, laying about 40 every time they breed. Like all crocodiles, this species has been affected by being hunted for its skin, and by coastal development. Its stronghold is in Central America, but a few hundred individuals live in Florida, at the north of its range.
382
animal life
BIRDS
MURRE DIVING
BIRDS THAT HAVE ADAPTED to life at sea spend their lives in the air above the surface, KINGDOM Animalia in the upper layers of the open ocean, or PHYLUM Chordata along shorelines. Shore- (littoral) based birds CLASS Aves rarely range far from land, and some visit the ORDERS 29 coast only at certain times of year. Others SPECIES About 9,500 are pelagic, often remaining at sea for months on end and returning to land only to breed. Unlike land birds, many pelagic sea birds breed in large colonies on islands and cliffs, deserting them when the breeding season ends. DOMAIN Eucarya
Using their wings as hydrofoils, common murres speed through icy water in search of fish. Members of the auk family, they are common in northern seas.
ANATOMY There is no such thing as a typical sea bird, although pelagic birds share many adaptations for life at sea. These include webbed feet, highly waterproof plumage, and glands that get rid of excess salt. Most terrestrial birds have hollow, air-filled bones (an adaptation that helps to save weight), but in diving species, such as penguins, the bones are denser and the air spaces reduced. Some plunge-divers, including gannets and pelicans, have air sacs under their skin. These cushion the impact as they hit the water and help them to bob back to the surface with their prey. Compared to these marine species, shoreline birds show few specific adaptations for life in or near salt water but, like all birds, they have bills specialized for dealing with different kinds of food. streamlined bill narrow wings ideal for long-distance flight
FLYING DIVER
The northern gannet’s streamlined shape is typical of a plunge diver. Its nostrils open inside its bill, enabling it to keep out water when it hits the surface.
webbed feet
tubular, external nostril
food pouch
BILL ADAPTATIONS
Apart from waterfowl, most birds of the sea and shore are carnivores, with bills that are adapted for different kinds of animal prey. A pelican’s bill and pouch work like a scoop, while an albatross’s hooked bill can grip slippery prey, such as jellyfish. Sea eagles catch their prey with their talons, but then use their bills to tear it into pieces. Curlews have long bills that can probe for animals buried in mud.
hooked tip
PELICAN
ALBATROSS
long bill can probe deep into estuarine mud
hooked bill
SEA EAGLE
CURLEW
OCEAN LIFE
HABITATS Birds live throughout the world’s oceans and shorelines, from the equator to the poles. Less than 200 species are truly pelagic, meaning that they ply the oceans. These oceanic birds include albatrosses, which have wingspans of up to 11 ft (3.5 m), and much smaller species, such as shearwaters and terns. Although they feed on sea animals, their true habitat is the air: the sooty tern, for example, hardly ever rests on the water and may spend its first five years entirely on the wing. However, food is widely scattered in the open oceans, which is why the majority of sea birds live closer to land. Most diving sea birds feed in the shallow waters over continental shelves, while rocky coasts and mudflats are key habitats for waders and gulls. Estuaries are important habitats for coastal birds. Their muddy silt often harbors numerous worms and mollusks, accessible at low tide. In the tropics, mangrove swamps attract birds for the same reason; they also have the added bonus of trees, in which birds nest and roost.
COASTAL WADERS OCEAN WANDERER
The black-browed albatross travels long distances in search of good feeding grounds. Its diet includes crustaceans, fish, squid, and carrion.
Eurasian oystercatchers feed in a variety of coastal habitats, from rocky shores to mudflats. These birds are waiting for the tide to turn so that they can start to feed.
birds ORDER ANSERIFORMES
Brant Goose Branta bernicla 22–26 in (55–66 cm) LENGTH
3–31/2 lb (1.3–1.6 kg)
WEIGHT
eggs and raising a single brood each year. Like many birds in the High Arctic, their numbers undergo steep fluctuations. In mild summers, most of their goslings survive, but if conditions are unusually cold, very few young live long enough to migrate when summer comes to an end.
ORDER ANSERIFORMES
Magellanic Flightless Steamer Duck
LENGTH 23–26 in (58–67 cm)
24–30 in (61–76 cm)
WEIGHT
83/4 –10 lb (4.0–4.5 kg)
HABITAT
Rocky coasts, inshore waters
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
A compact bird with a gray body, black head, and black neck, the Brant goose breeds in the High Arctic but winters on coasts at temperate latitudes—a pattern followed by many other wildfowl. Its preferred food is eelgrass, a marine plant that grows in shallow water, but in its winter quarters it also grazes in coastal fields. Brant geese nest in colonies in lowlying coastal tundra, laying up to five
2–31/4 lb (0.85–1.45 kg)
Southern South America
This heavily built duck is one of three closely related species, all from South America, that have lost the ability to fly. Like other steamer ducks, it has mottled gray plumage, yellow legs, and a robust, yellow-orange bill. It feeds on mussels, crabs and other small animals, diving among kelp beds to find its food. If threatened, it paddles noisily across the water with its wings, a behavior known as “steaming.”
Coasts, estuaries, salt lakes
DISTRIBUTION
Europe, North Africa, Asia
With its brightly colored body and orange-red bill, the common shelduck is an eye-catching inhabitant of muddy shores. Normally seen in pairs, it feeds by dabbling in mud to collect small animals exposed by the falling tide. It nests in holes, and raises up to nine young each year. After breeding, common shelducks gather together to moult in flocks of up to 100,000 birds.
HUMAN IMPACT
Common Eider Somateria mollissima 20–28 in (50–71 cm) LENGTH
23/4 –61/4 lb (1.2–2.8 kg)
WEIGHT
Shallow coasts,
estuaries DISTRIBUTION
Tadorna tadorna
WEIGHT
DISTRIBUTION Arctic (breeding); North America, northwest Europe, China, Japan (non-breeding)
HABITAT
Common Shelduck
LENGTH
Estuaries, tundra, coastal grassland
ORDER ANSERIFORMES
ORDER ANSERIFORMES
Tachyeres pteneres
HABITAT
385
Arctic Ocean, north Atlantic,
north Pacific
This heavily built duck is a common sight on Arctic coasts, where it dives to catch mollusks and crabs, cracking them open with its powerful bill. The females are mottled brown, while the males (below) are mainly black and white, with a pink breast and greenish neck. Common eiders breed in groups, building their nests close to the sea. After the breeding season, they move to more temperate zones in the south of their range for the winter months.
%)$%2$/7. 4OKEEPTHEEGGSANDYOUNG WARM FEMALEEIDERSLINETHEIR NESTWITHDOWNFEATHERSPLUCKED FROMTHEIRBREAST%IDERDOWNIS ASUPERBINSULATORANDHASLONG BEENUSEDASAFILLINGFORCLOTHES ANDBEDDING)TISSTILLCOLLECTED IN)CELAND ALTHOUGHDEMAND HASDWINDLEDFOLLOWINGTHE INTRODUCTIONOFSYNTHETICFIBERS ORDER ANSERIFORMES
Red-breasted Merganser Mergus serrator LENGTH 20–23 in (52–58 cm)
21/4 –23/4 lb (1–1.25 kg)
WEIGHT
Coasts, estuaries, lakes, rivers
HABITAT
DOWN OF THE COMMON EIDER
Arctic and subarctic (breeding); temperate coasts (non-breeding)
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
This is one the most widespread sawbill ducks—ducks that have narrow beaks with serrated edges, like the teeth of a saw. All these birds dive for fish, using their specially adapted bills to grip their slippery prey. Like other sawbills, the red-breasted merganser has an elongated body, a long neck, and orange-red legs. Males (right) have a metallic green head and shaggy crest, while the female’s head is rustcolored, with a less flamboyant crest. These birds breed near fresh water, but spend the winter on coasts, where the water is less likely to freeze. Females build a nest in dense cover, or in a tree-hole, lining it with down. They lay up to 11 eggs, raising a single brood a year. Red-breasted mergansers are hunted in some parts of their range in order to protect fish stocks, although there is little evidence that they actually do much harm.
386
ORDER SPHENISCIFORMES
King Penguin Aptenodytes patagonicus 331/2 –371/2 in (85–95 cm)
HEIGHT
26–31 lb (12–14 kg)
WEIGHT
Rocky coasts, open ocean
HABITAT
Southern Ocean, subantarctic islands including Falkland Islands
DISTRIBUTION
This is the largest penguin found on shores outside Antarctica. Like its close relative the emperor penguin, it has a blue-black body with a white chest and conspicuous, yellow-orange markings on its head. Males and females look identical, and they share the task of incubating the single egg. Instead of building a nest, they cradle the egg on their broad webbed feet, where it is kept warm by a flap of skin. Their bodies are protected from the cold by short, densely-packed feathers and a thick layer of blubber. King penguins feed on fish and squid, diving to depths of over 650 ft (200 m) to hunt their prey. At one time, these birds were exploited commercially for their blubber, oil, and feathers, but today they are fully protected.
OCEAN LIFE
"2%%$).'/54/&34%0 +INGPENGUINSHAVEABREEDINGCYCLEFOUND INNOOTHERSEABIRD4HECYCLEBEGINSIN .OVEMBER©THESTARTOFTHESOUTHERNSUMMER© WHENTHEFEMALELAYSHERFIRSTEGG4HECHICK TAKESDAYSTOHATCH THENSTAYSWITHITS PARENTSFORMONTHS/NCETHECHICKIS INDEPENDENT THEFEMALEMUSTCOMPLETEHER MOLTBEFORELAYINGAGAIN THISTIMEINLATEFALL !SARESULT THEKINGPENGUINSBREEDINGCYCLE TAKESMONTHSANDMOVESINANDOUTOFPHASE WITHTHECALENDARYEAR
KING PENGUIN CHICKS
birds ORDER SPHENISCIFORMES
ORDER SPHENISCIFORMES
Emperor Penguin
Chinstrap Penguin
Aptenodytes forsteri
Pygoscelis antarctica
43–45 in (110–115 cm)
HEIGHT
28–30 in (71–76 cm)
77–88 lb (35–40 kg)
WEIGHT 61/2 –10 lb (3–4.5 kg)
Sea ice, rocky coasts, open ocean
HABITAT
HEIGHT
WEIGHT
Rocky coasts, open ocean
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Southern Ocean, Antarctica
The emperor is the world’s largest penguin and the only species that breeds in Antarctica during the southern winter. In shape and markings, it is very similar to the king penguin, but it can be over twice its weight. Rarely found outside Antarctic waters, it feeds among broken sea ice, diving to depths of up to 1,750 ft (530 m). It can remain underwater for as long as 20 minutes, and may travel up to 600 miles (1,000 km) in search of food. The emperor penguin breeds in scattered colonies on the ice itself. Adult females lay a single egg in early winter, and then transfer it to the male. During the winter darkness, while the females feed at sea, the males huddle together with their eggs balanced on their feet and protected within a fold of feathery skin. The incubation period lasts about two months. By the end of it, the males have lost about half their body weight. The females return when the chicks hatch, releasing the males, who head out to sea.
ORDER SPHENISCIFORMES
Little Penguin Eudyptula minor 16–18 in (40–45 cm)
HEIGHT
WEIGHT
21/4 lb (1 kg)
Rocky and muddy coasts, open ocean
HABITAT
Southern Australia, New Zealand, Tasman Sea and Southern Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
away any larger penguins that attempt to nest nearby. The female lays two eggs, and her chicks fledge and set off for the sea by February or March, when the southern fall begins. Chinstraps feed almost entirely on krill, and their current population growth, like that of Antarctica’s krilleating seals, may be linked to the decline of krill-eating baleen whales.
Southern Ocean, Antarctic Peninsula, subantarctic islands
DISTRIBUTION
chinstrap marking
Easily identified by the black line around its chin, the chinstrap penguin is one of the most abundant penguin species. Males and females look identical, with blue-black bodies, white undersides, and straight black bills. They live at sea for most of the year, feeding in open water north of the polar ice.When swimming at high speed, they often leap clear of the water, or “porpoise,” which allows them to breathe and coats their bodies with a layer of air bubbles, reducing friction with the water. In November, chinstraps return to their breeding colonies on ice-free shores in Antarctica and on islands in the Southern Ocean. Here, they make their nests by scraping together small stones to form a shallow cup. Chinstraps tend to be more aggressive than other penguins, particularly when breeding. They steal stones from their neighbors and chase
3!&%49!&4%2 $!2+ )NSOMEPARTSOFTHEIRRANGE© SUCHAS0HILLIP)SLAND NEAR -ELBOURNE©THOUSANDSOFLITTLE PENGUINSCANBESEENSCRAMBLING ASHOREASTHELIGHTFADES4HIS BEHAVIORPROTECTSTHEMFROM MOSTPREDATORS ALTHOUGHNOT FROMINTRODUCEDMAMMALSSUCH ASFOXESANDDOMESTICDOGS
This is the smallest penguin, and it is also the only one that remains offshore during daylight, coming onto land after dark. It has a white underside, a gray-blue back and head, and no distinctive markings. During daylight, little penguins are often seen in small flotillas offshore, resting on the surface and periodically diving to catch fish.
ORDER SPHENISCIFORMES
Macaroni Penguin Eudyptes chrysolophus HEIGHT
271/2 in
(70 cm) WEIGHT
91/4 lb (4.2 kg)
Rocky coasts, open ocean
HABITAT
Southern Ocean, Antarctic Peninsula, subantarctic islands, southern South America
DISTRIBUTION
Macaroni penguins are often seen together with a similar species of penguin, the rockhopper. However, macaronis are significantly larger and have distinctive flame-yellow crests that run above each eye and meet on the forehead. They are also found farther south, breeding on ice-free coasts on the Antarctic Peninsula. Their breeding colonies are extremely noisy, some containing over a million pairs spaced out just beyond pecking distance of each other. Macaroni penguins lay two eggs a year, and both parents help with incubation. Their reproductive rate is low, because only one nestling normally survives.
ORDER SPHENISCIFORMES
ORDER SPHENISCIFORMES
Magellanic Penguin
Jackass Penguin
Spheniscus magellanicus
Spheniscus demersus
HEIGHT
28 in (71 cm)
WEIGHT
12 lb
24–28 in (60–70 cm)
HEIGHT
(5.5 kg)
WEIGHT
Rocky coasts, open ocean
HABITAT
11 lb (5 kg)
Rocky coasts, open ocean
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Southern South America, Falkland Islands, south Atlantic and south Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Coastal waters of southern Africa, south Atlantic and southern Indian Ocean
One of two species of black-andwhite penguin from South America, the Magellanic penguin is identified by the two black bands across its breast (see below). It feeds in the cold waters that flow northward from the Southern Ocean, eating small, shoalforming fish such as sardines. Like its close relative, the Humboldt penguin, it nests in burrows, raising up to two chicks each year.
Also known as the Cape penguin, the jackass is the only penguin that breeds in Africa. Physically, it bears a strong resemblance to the Magellanic penguin (see left) from South America, although it has a single black breast band rather than two. It feeds on small fish such as pilchards, sardines, and anchovies, and gets its name from its braying call, which may be heard onshore when it breeds. Jackass penguins nest in burrows, and in the past, many of their nesting sites were destroyed by farmers collecting their droppings, or guano, for use as fertilizer. Today, depletion of food stocks due to overfishing and oil spills are two major threats that they face, along with competition from fur seals for breeding sites. Their numbers are in sharp decline.
OCEAN LIFE
When feeding, they circle around small fish to concentrate them into a close-knit group, before swimming through the shoal and snapping them up. Unlike other penguins, they do not leave the water when they travel at speed. Little penguins usually nest in burrows or among fallen rocks, but may set up home in breakwaters and under houses and sheds. Each female lays a clutch of two eggs and raises up to two broods a year.
387
EMPEROR PENGUINS
The emperor penguin is one of the hardiest animals in the world, able to withstand exposure to blizzards on land and deep dives in the freezing waters of the Southern Ocean. The young and adult birds seen here are sheltering from a winter snowstorm in temperatures of –4 to –22ºF (–20 to –30ºC).
390
animal life
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Black-footed Albatross Phoebastria nigripes LENGTH 27–29 in (68–74 cm) WEIGHT 61/2 –73/4 lb (3–3.5 kg)
Open ocean, atolls, isolated islands
HABITAT
North Pacific, Johnston Island and Marshall Islands
DISTRIBUTION
This dark-colored sea bird is often seen in summer off North America’s west coast. One of three species of albatross found in the north Pacific, its dark underwings distinguish it from the other two. It is fond of scavenging, and often follows trawlers and shrimping boats to catch discarded offal. Black-footed albatrosses breed in colonies on islands in the central and western Pacific. Like other albatrosses, they perform elaborate courtship displays. All albatrosses are monogamous, pairing up to breed with the same partner each fall.
HUMAN IMPACT
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Albatrosses usually swallow their food whole, so long-line hooks become lodged in their stomachs and drag the birds underwater to drown.
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Short-tailed Albatross Light-mantled Phoebastria albatrus Sooty Albatross LENGTH 33–37 in (84–94 cm) WEIGHT
61/2 –11
Phoebetria palpebrata LENGTH 31–39 in (79–98 cm)
lb
(3–5 kg)
5–10 lb (2.5–4.5 kg)
WEIGHT
Remote islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
Remote islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
North Pacific, Tori Shima Island and Senkaku Islands
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER GAVIIFORMES
Common Loon Gavia immer LENGTH 28–35 in (70–90 cm)
61/2 –10 lb (3–4.5 kg)
WEIGHT
Freshwater lakes (breeding); coasts
OCEAN LIFE
HABITAT
Northern North America, Greenland, Iceland, Europe, north Pacific, north Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
This striking bird is best known for its haunting cry, which echoes across freshwater lakes during the summer breeding season. During the winter, the same bird is a common visitor in coastal waters, although at this time of year its black-and-white breeding
plumage is replaced by less eyecatching shades of brownish black and gray. Like other divers, it has a streamlined body, small wings, and webbed feet set far back—a feature that makes it clumsy on land. On water, it is far more graceful. It floats with its bill held at a characteristic upward slant and can dive to depths of over 250 ft (75 m) to catch fish— its principal food. During the summer months, common loons usually live in pairs, carrying out spectacular courtship displays. When the breeding season comes to an end, they migrate to sheltered coasts, where there is less risk of icing. In North America, flocks of several hundred often gather on the Great Lakes, before heading south as far as the coast of Florida. In Europe, they winter on Atlantic coasts, dispersing as far south as Portugal.
Southern Ocean, isolated islands in south Atlantic and southern Indian Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
This north Pacific albatross almost became extinct during the early 1900s due to demand for its feathers. By 1950, only about 20 birds were left. Thanks to conservation measures, the population now stands at nearly 2,000, all breeding on remote islands in the far west of its range. Adults are mostly white, with black flight feathers, pink bills, and golden-yellow heads.
Together with its close relative the sooty albatross, this is one of two southern albatrosses that have sooty brown plumage, as opposed to white and black. The sooty albatross is brown all over, but the light-mantled species has a pale gray nape and back— the feature that gives it its name. A graceful glider, it feeds on fish, squid, and crustaceans. It is also highly inquisitive and often follows ships. After spending the winter at sea, it returns to its breeding sites by August, the start of the southern spring. Female birds lay a single egg in early summer, and the chicks become independent about four months after they hatch—a relatively rapid development compared with that of the larger albatrosses.
391 ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Wandering Albatross Diomedea exulans 31/2 –41/2 ft (1.1–1.35 m)
LENGTH
18–25 lb (8–11.5 kg)
WEIGHT
Remote islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Southern Ocean, south Atlantic, southern Indian and Pacific oceans
This legendary sea bird has the largest recorded wingspan of any bird, at up to 111/2 ft (3.5 m). It is restricted to the windswept southern oceans, where it feeds mainly on squid, snatching its food from the surface of the water. It is capable of remaining airborne for weeks at a time and frequently follows ships, soaring over the waves on its stiff, outstretched wings. The wandering albatross takes up to 11 years to mature, and during that time it gradually loses its juvenile plumage, becoming all white except for black markings on the tips and trailing edges of its wings. These birds nest on remote islands, typically breeding in alternate years.
,/.' ).#5"!4)/. 7ANDERINGALBATROSSESBUILD LARGE MOUNDLIKENESTSFROM MUD GRASS ANDMOSS4HEIR SINGLEEGGHASONEOFTHELONGEST INCUBATIONPERIODSOFANYEGG TAKINGBETWEENANDDAYS TOHATCH4HESOLITARYCHICKTHEN REMAINSINTHENESTFORUPTONINE MONTHS WHEREITISFEDBYBOTH ITSPARENTS$URINGVERYSEVERE WEATHER THECHICKMAYBELEFT UNATTENDEDFORDAYSATATIME
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Black-browed Albatross Thalassarche melanophrys LENGTH 33–37 in (83–93 cm) WEIGHT
61/2 –11 lb
(3–5 kg) Remote islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
Southern Ocean, south Atlantic, southern Indian and Pacific oceans
DISTRIBUTION
Also known as the black-browed mollymawk, this is the most numerous and widespread of the albatrosses. It is found from Antarctica to the edge of the tropics, and in places even farther north. Its wings, back, and tail are grayish black, and it has a distinctive black brow above each eye. It feeds on fish, squid, octopus, and crustaceans, and is also a frequent ship-follower, congregating in large numbers when waste is thrown overboard. Black-browed albatrosses breed on remote islands and take at least five years to become mature. They are among the few southern albatrosses that regularly cross the equator—isolated sightings have been recorded as far north as the British Isles.
OCEAN LIFE
392
Animal life ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Southern Giant Petrel
Northern Fulmar Fulmarus glacialis
Macronectes giganteus
LENGTH 18–20 in (45–51 cm)
34–39 in (86–99 cm) LENGTH
WEIGHT
WEIGHT 11/2 –2 lb (700–900 g)
11 lb (5 kg)
Coasts, open sea; nests on ice-free coasts
Rocky coasts,
HABITAT
open sea
HABITAT
North Pacific, north Atlantic, ice-free areas of Arctic Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
Often mistaken for a gull, this fulmar is actually a petrel and, like other petrels, has distinctive tubular nostrils. Common throughout northern waters, it is often seen flying over cliffs on its stiff, outstretched wings. Its weak feet make it clumsy on land, and its eyes are dark with a distinct brow ridge. Most northern fulmars in the Atlantic have white bodies and bluegray upper wings, but in the Pacific many of the birds are much darker. Northern fulmars feed on small
animals at or near the sea’s surface, and they gather in large flocks to scavenge around fishing boats. They breed on exposed cliff ledges, with each female laying a single egg directly onto the rock. The incubation period is 52 days—almost twice as long as that in gulls of similar size. Despite its low reproductive rate, the northern fulmar has increased both in range and in numbers in recent years. It is exceptionally long-lived for its size, with ages of over 50 years recorded.
Southern hemisphere, from Antarctica as far north as the tropics
DISTRIBUTION
Part-scavenger and part-predator, this large petrel is often seen on the fringes of penguin colonies or near the carcasses of dead seals and whales. It uses its powerful bill to tear apart carrion and to kill young birds. Most adults have a pale head and a dark grayish brown back, but some are almost completely white with scattered black flecks. tubular nostrils
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Snow Petrel
Fairy Prion
Pagodroma nivea
Pachyptila turtur LENGTH
12–14 in (30–35 cm)
LENGTH 10–11 in (25–28 cm)
WEIGHT
9–16 oz (250–450 g)
WEIGHT
Rocky and icebound coasts
HABITAT
5–8 oz (150–225 g)
Islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
Antarctica, subantarctic islands, Southern Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
Despite its dainty appearance, the snow petrel is one of the world’s most southerly breeding birds. This entirely white petrel nests on ice-free cliffs in and near Antarctica, to within 680 miles (1,100 km) of the South Pole. It picks food from the surface of the sea, rarely straying far from the polar ice. Flocks of snow petrels are often seen sitting on icebergs.
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Bonin Petrel Pterodroma hypoleuca LENGTH
12 in (30 cm)
WEIGHT
8 oz (225 g)
Oceanic islands (breeding); open ocean
OCEAN LIFE
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Northwestern Pacific
There are over two dozen species of Pterodroma petrels, mostly in tropical and subtropical regions, and these are often difficult to distinguish at sea. The Bonin petrel is a typical example from the northwestern Pacific, where it
nests on scattered islands westward from Hawaii. It has a small, short, slightly hooked bill and sharply pointed wings, and it is fast and agile as it speeds through the air just above the waves. It eats small planktonic animals, usually landing on the surface to feed. This petrel nests in burrows but has difficulty moving on land. To reduce the risk of attack from predators, the Bonin petrel generally returns to land at night, when it may deliver regurgitated food to its single chick. The parents share the task of egg incubation over about 49 days. On remote islands, petrel colonies can be decimated by introduced predators, such as rats and cats. This species is one that has been badly affected.
Southern Ocean and adjoining waters
A small, oceanic petrel, the fairy prion has a pale body and blue-gray upper wings with a distinct, M-shaped black band. It lives in flocks and feeds at night, using its bill to sieve planktonic animals from the water. It breeds on isolated coasts, laying a single egg either in a burrow or in a hollow deep among fallen rocks.
393 ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Great Shearwater Puffinus gravis LENGTH 18–21 in (46–53 cm) WEIGHT 13/4 –2 lb (800–900 kg)
Oceanic islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Atlantic Ocean, except off west coast of Africa south of Sierra Leone
This ocean-living sea bird is a wideranging migrant and is found across most of the Atlantic Ocean during the course of the year. It breeds in the far south, on some of the world’s remotest islands. One of these, Nightingale Island in the Tristan da Cunha group, is home to about four million birds. Great shearwaters have pointed wings with dark brown upper surfaces. Their undersides are much paler, making the birds look alternately black then white during their tilting flight. Sometimes vocal at sea, they wail and scream noisily from their burrows when breeding. These calls are thought to help incoming birds to locate their mates after dark.
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Short-tailed Shearwater Puffinus tenuirostris 16–17 in (41–43 cm) LENGTH
WEIGHT
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Wilson’s Storm Petrel Oceanites oceanicus LENGTH 6–71/2 in (15–19 cm)
1–11/2 oz (30–40 g)
WEIGHT
Coasts, islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
Worldwide except for north Pacific and extreme north Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
a single chick. Fed on a rich diet of oily food, the chicks weigh more than their parents by the time they leave the nest. For several centuries, shearwater chicks have been harvested for their oil and meat. The practice continues today, although the numbers killed are now strictly controlled.
Little bigger than a sparrow, Wilson’s storm petrel is reputed to be the world’s most numerous ocean-going sea bird. It breeds in widely scattered colonies, and its total population is unknown but may exceed 20 million. At sea this bird may be difficult to distinguish from its close relatives, but its plumage is uniformly sooty brown, apart from a band of white at the base of its tail. When feeding, storm petrels
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
Leach’s Storm Petrel Oceanodroma leucorhoa LENGTH 71/2 –81/2 in (19–22 cm)
11/2 –13/4 oz (40–50 g)
WEIGHT
1–11/2 lb
Coasts, islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
(500–700 g) Open ocean, offshore islands
HABITAT
with its feet and occasionally settling on the water to rest. Leach’s storm petrels breed in colonies, laying a single egg and returning to their burrows at night with food for their hatched young. In the far north, some birds delay nesting until August to avoid the 24-hour daylight of the Arctic summer, during which they would be more vulnerable to predators.
North Pacific, north Atlantic, coastal North America and Aleutian Islands
DISTRIBUTION
DISTRIBUTION North Pacific, southwestern Pacific around southern coast of Australia
Leach’s storm petrel is silent at sea, but it makes a high-pitched purring sound, interrupted by sharp whistles, in and near its nest. Unlike Wilson’s storm petrel (see above), this species breeds in the Northern Hemisphere. It migrates southward in late summer, roaming throughout the north Pacific and much of the Atlantic. Small and brownish black, with a sharply forked tail, it flies rapidly, changing direction frequently as it scans the water’s surface for food. It feeds on planktonic animals and small fish, pattering on the surface
Awkward and ungainly on land, the short-tailed shearwater is a tireless flier, skirting around most of the north Pacific during its annual migration. Like other shearwaters, it travels just inches above the waves in fastmoving flocks, interrupting its flight whenever it spots food. However, it has a narrower bill than other shearwaters, and its overall color is a dark, smoky brown. It nests in vast island colonies, each pair producing
-)'2!4)/.
ORDER PROCELLARIIFORMES
June– August
September
Common Diving Petrel Pelecanoides urinatrix
April– May
LENGTH 8–10 in (20–25 cm)
October
4–41/2 oz (110–130 g)
WEIGHT
Coasts, islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
November– March
DISTRIBUTION
and islands
Southern Ocean and adjoining waters
This stubby bird with pointed wings and pale blue feet is the Southern Hemisphere’s counterpart of the auklets (see p.403). Despite being unrelated, it shares the auklets’ fast, low flight and their feeding technique. Instead of searching for food on the wing, like other petrels, it dives, using its wings to swim. It frequently flies straight through waves, emerging with rapidly whirring wings on the other side. This species nests in burrows, returning to its nests after dark. There are three other similar-looking species, all found in southern seas.
OCEAN LIFE
4HESHORT TAILEDSHEARWATERHAS AUNIQUEFIGURE EIGHTMIGRATION ROUTE MILES KM LONG THATTAKESADVANTAGEOF PREVAILINGWINDS!FTERLAYINGEGGS IN.OVEMBERAND$ECEMBER THE BIRDSHEADNORTHIN!PRILAND-AY REACHINGTHE"ERING3EABY!UGUST 4HEYTHENMOVESOUTHALONG.ORTH !MERICASWEST KEY COAST BEFORE breeding area RETURNINGTO migration route THEIRBREEDING wind direction COLONIES
rarely settle on the water. Instead, they flutter their wings and patter the surface with their feet, pecking up planktonic animals. When food is abundant, they may suddenly appear in huge numbers then disappear with equal abruptness. Wilson’s storm petrel breeds as far south as Antarctica, digging a burrow with its bill and feet. It migrates northward when the southern summer comes to an end.
394
animal life ORDER CICONIIFORMES
ORDER CICONIIFORMES
Gray Heron
Little Egret
Ardea cinerea
Egretta garzetta LENGTH
34–39 in (90–100 cm)
LENGTH 22–27 in (56–65 cm)
WEIGHT
31/2 –41/2 lb (1.6–2 kg)
WEIGHT
Estuaries, lagoons, coasts
HABITAT
11–16 oz (300–450 g)
Muddy coasts, mangrove swamps
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Europe, mainland Asia (except far north), Japan, Indonesia, Africa, Madagascar
DISTRIBUTION
Southern Europe, Africa, southern Asia, Southeast Asia, Australasia
Commonly seen in fresh water, the gray heron also frequently visits shores, especially in areas where lakes and ponds freeze in winter. Tall, graybacked, and often immobile, it waits patiently for fish or other animals to come within range, then seizes them with a rapid jab of its daggerlike bill. On coasts, its feeding method restricts it to shallow water on rocky and lowlying shores, where it often follows the falling tide. Gray herons fly with slow wingbeats, their heads hunched into their shoulders and their legs trailing behind. They nest in trees, typically inland near water.
Pure white with black legs, a black bill, and bright yellow facial skin, the little egret is usually seen on its own or in scattered groups, wading quietly through shallow water on coasts. This bird feeds on fish and other shoreline animals that are disturbed by its approach. During the breeding season, both males and females grow long, lacy feathers on their heads and backs. They nest in trees, building flimsy nests out of sticks.
ORDER CICONIIFORMES
Pacific Reef Egret Egretta sacra LENGTH 24–27 in (60–70 cm)
14–26 oz (400–750 g)
WEIGHT
Coastal and freshwater wetlands
HABITAT
Australasia, Pacific islands, western Pacific coast from Southeast Asia to Japan
DISTRIBUTION
This compact shoreline egret has two contrasting color forms, so different that they look like separate species. One form (or morph) is completely
ORDER PELECANIFORMES
Great Frigatebird Fregata minor LENGTH 34–39 in (86–100 cm)
3–4 lb (1.4–1.8 kg)
WEIGHT
Coasts, islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
Tropical regions in Indian Ocean and Pacific, sporadic in tropical Atlantic
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER PELECANIFORMES
OCEAN LIFE
Red-billed Tropicbird Phaethon aethereus Up to 191/2 in (50 cm) excluding tail
LENGTH
11/4 –13/4 lb (600–800 g)
WEIGHT
Coasts, islands (breeding); open ocean
HABITAT
Eastern Pacific, Caribbean, tropical Atlantic, northeast Indian Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
The largest of the three species of tropicbird, this elegant sea bird spends most of its life flying over the open ocean, often hundreds of miles from land. From a distance the red-billed tropicbird resembles a dove, but for two highly distinctive tail streamers that flutter behind it as it flies. It feeds by plunge-diving, hovering to locate its prey before diving with half-folded wings into the sea. Despite being very buoyant, it seldom swims. Like other tropicbirds, it nests on remote coasts and oceanic islands and is rarely seen outside tropical waters.
white, with a pale yellow bill and yellow-gray legs. The other form has a similarly colored bill and legs, but its plumage is dark gray. The balance between the two forms varies. In some islands in the tropical Pacific the white form predominates, but in New Zealand, the overwhelming majority are gray. Pacific Reef Egrets forage alone or in small groups, feeding on small fish, crabs, and mollusks. When hunting, they hold their heads and bodies almost horizontally and often shade the water with their half-spread wings. Unlike most egrets, they frequently nest on the ground, among fallen rocks or in coastal caves, as well as in low-growing trees. With their extraordinarily long wings and slender bodies, frigatebirds are unrivaled experts at gliding flight. The five species all have glossy black plumage, strong, hooked bills, and small, webbed feet. The males also have a bright red throat pouch, which they inflate during courtship displays. Despite weighing less than a large gull, the great frigatebird has a wingspan of up to 71/2 ft (2.3 m), allowing it to glide for hours while making only the merest flick of its wings. As it flies, it observes other sea birds as they feed, then pursues them to steal their catch. Frigatebirds also hunt their own food, snapping it up from the sea’s surface. They nest in coastal bushes, where they make flimsy nests out of twigs.
birds ORDER PELECANIFORMES
ORDER PELECANIFORMES
Brown Pelican
Northern Gannet
Pelecanus occidentalis
Morus bassanus
LENGTH
4–51/4 ft (1.2–1.6 m)
LENGTH 34–39 in (87–100 cm)
WEIGHT 73/4 –10 lb (3.5–4.5 kg)
WEIGHT 61/4 –7 lb (2.8–3.2 kg)
Coastal waters, estuaries, islands
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Pacific and Atlantic coasts of North and South America, Galápagos Islands
DISTRIBUTION
Commonly seen inshore and in harbors, the brown pelican is the heaviest sea bird that fishes by plungediving. Groups of birds often fish together, skimming over the waves before rising into the air, folding back their wings, and hitting the water with a spectacular splash. The pelican’s throat pouch balloons outward underwater, scooping up prey, which it then swallows at the surface.
This highly streamlined bird with its gleaming white body and black-tipped wings is the most striking plungediver in the north Atlantic. Northern gannets roam the seas with a distinctive pattern of flapping and gliding flight, attacking shoals of fish by diving from heights of up to 100 ft (30 m). They breed in crowded colonies on rocky islands and clifftops, laying a
Eastern and western coasts of
north Atlantic
ORDER PELECANIFORMES
Brown Booby Sula leucogaster LENGTH 25–30 in (64–76 cm)
11/2 –31/4 lb (0.7–1.5 kg)
WEIGHT
Inshore waters, rocky coasts, islands
HABITAT
Tropical oceans worldwide, except southeastern Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Blue-footed Booby Sula nebouxii
sometimes diving into water less than 3 ft (1 m) deep. They nest in small colonies on offshore islands, laying their eggs on the ground.
LENGTH 30–33 in (76–84 cm) WEIGHT 21/4 –41/2 lb (1.5–2 kg)
Inshore waters, rocky coasts, islands
HABITAT
single egg each year. Juveniles take five years to mature, gradually losing their brown plumage. During that time, they roam far over the ocean before returning to their native colony to breed.
Open sea, rocky coasts, offshore islands
HABITAT
ORDER PELECANIFORMES
395
This booby is a superb diver. It is the most widespread booby and has distinct color variations. Most brown boobies are brown all over, apart from a white underside. However, birds from the eastern Pacific have white heads and their bills are gray rather than the typical bright yellow. They all live in the same way, diving for fish and squid from heights of up to 100 ft (30 m). They also skim low over the surface, looking for flying fish, which they catch in midair. They often fly in front of ships, watching for fish caught up in the bow-waves, and they like to fish close to land, roosting on buoys or coastal trees. Despite their agility in the air, they are clumsy at takeoff and landing.
0,5.'% $)6).' 'ANNETSANDBOOBIESALLSHOW ADAPTATIONSFORAPLUNGE DIVING LIFESTYLEFORWARD FACINGEYES STREAMLINEDHEADSANDBILLS ANDNOSTRILSWITHNOEXTERNAL OPENINGS4HEIRWINGSFOLDBACK ALONGTHEBODYJUSTBEFORETHE MOMENTOFIMPACT ANDTHEFORCE ISABSORBEDBYAIRSACS UNDERTHEIRSKIN AERIAL ATTACK
This sequence of photos shows how the wings fold during a dive.
pale, streaked head plumage
DISTRIBUTION Pacific coast of Central America, Galápagos Islands
distinctive blue webbed feet
OCEAN LIFE
This is one of six species of boobies— a group of plunge-diving birds, closely related to gannets, that often have brightly colored feet. The blue-footed booby is brown with white undersides. Its feet are grayish brown in juveniles but brilliant turquoise-blue in adults. Blue-footed boobies often feed in flocks, hitting the water almost simultaneously when they locate a shoal of fish. Smaller than gannets, they are able to fish closer inshore,
396
animal life ORDER PELECANIFORMES
Guanay Cormorant Phalacrocorax bougainvillii 29–31 in (74–78 cm) LENGTH
4–5 lb (1.75–2.25 kg)
WEIGHT
Desert coasts, islands, inshore waters
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Pacific coast of Peru and northern
Chile
OCEAN LIFE
Boldly marked in black and white, with a conspicuous red patch around each eye, the Guanay cormorant nests in huge colonies along the coast of the
Atacama Desert, the most arid region on Earth. It feeds on anchovetas— small fish that abound in the cold waters of the Humboldt Current. Like other cormorants, it pursues fish underwater, holding its wings against its body and propelling itself with its legs. It floats low down in the water, periodically dipping its head beneath the surface to check for food. Guanay cormorants have nested on the same offshore islands for millennia, depositing deep layers of desiccated droppings known as guano. During El Niño years, when the ocean temperature rises, shortage of food forces these cormorants to forage far afield, often as far north as Panama.
HUMAN IMPACT
4(%'5!./42!$% "EFORETHEINVENTIONOFSYNTHETIC FERTILIZERS NITROGEN RICHGUANOWAS ANEXTREMELYVALUABLECOMMODITY 4HOUSANDSOFTONSWEREEXPORTED FROMTHE3OUTH!MERICANCOASTTO THE.ORTHERN(EMISPHERE'UANO WASALSOUSEDINTHEMANUFACTURE OFEXPLOSIVES GUANO MINING
Using picks and shovels, workers dig up compacted guano on an island off the coast of southern Peru.
birds ORDER PELECANIFORMES
Great Cormorant Phalacrocorax carbo 32–40 in (80–101 cm) LENGTH
41/4 –51/2 lb (2–2.5 kg)
WEIGHT
Coasts, inshore waters, rivers, lakes
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Northeast North America, Europe, Africa, Asia, Australasia
Equally at home in fresh water and at sea, the great cormorant can be found across a vast swath of the world, from Greenland to Australasia. From a distance, its plumage looks jet black, but close up it has a greenish metallic
sheen, with white patches that vary between local races. Like its many relatives, it fishes by pursuit diving and its feathers are only partly waterproof. After feeding, it rests with its wings spread apart to dry. Great cormorants have a strong, direct flight, with steady flapping interspersed with short glides. They can often be seen in small groups, skimming just above the surface of the sea or following rivers inland. They nest on rocky ledges and in trees, making a platform out of seaweed, flotsam, or twigs, and the females lay three or four greenishwhite eggs. Great cormorants are sometimes persecuted by anglers, particularly in trout-fishing regions, but they remain highly successful.
black flight feathers in adult
ORDER FALCONIFORMES
Brahminy Kite Haliastur indus LENGTH 17–20 in (43–51 cm)
short, wedgeshaped tail
14–25 oz (400–700 g)
WEIGHT
Beaches, estuaries, rivers
HABITAT
South and Southeast Asia, northern Australia, islands of western Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER FALCONIFORMES
White-bellied Sea Eagle Haliaeetus leucogaster LENGTH 28–35 in (70–90 cm)
51/2 –91/4 lb (2.5–4.2 kg)
WEIGHT
Inshore waters, rivers, lakes, reservoirs
HABITAT
South and Southeast Asia, New Guinea, Australia
DISTRIBUTION
This black-and-white eagle makes an impressive sight as it soars over water with its wings, up to 6½ ft (2 m) wide, held in a shallow V shape. Its wideranging diet includes fish, water birds, turtles, and sea snakes, which it snatches from the surface, rarely entering the water. It also scavenges and forces smaller sea birds to drop their catch. It breeds close to water, building a large nest in a high tree.
ORDER FALCONIFORMES
Osprey Pandion haliaetus LENGTH 20–26 in (50–65 cm)
23/4 –41/2 lb (1.2–2 kg)
WEIGHT
Coasts, reefs, lagoons, rivers, lakes
HABITAT
Worldwide except polar regions, southern South America and New Zealand
DISTRIBUTION
This fish-eating hawk has one of the widest distributions of any bird of prey, breeding mainly in the Northern Hemisphere and migrating south for the winter. The Osprey is easy to distinguish from other birds of prey on coasts, thanks to its light build, its
!)2"/2.%!44!#+ 4HE/SPREYCRUISESHIGHABOVE WATERLOOKINGFORFOOD/NCE ITSPOTSAFISH ITHOVERSFORA FEWSECONDSBEFOREHALF FOLDING ITSWINGSANDGOINGINTOASTEEP DIVE)THITSTHEWATERATHIGH SPEED SOMETIMESPARTLYSUB MERGING BEFOREGRIPPINGITS PREYWITHONEFOOTANDCLIMBING LABORIOUSLYBACKINTOTHEAIR /NCEAIRBORNE ITSHAKESTHE WATEROFFITSPLUMAGE BEFORE HEADINGTOAPERCHINGPOST ORTOITSNEST
A common scavenger in parts of its range, the Brahminy kite is also an effective hunter, crisscrossing the water from a height of a few yards, dropping to the surface to catch fish, or to pick up scraps of waste. It also feeds on beaches and mudflats, and is seen in the outskirts of coastal towns. Adults have deep chestnut plumage, and a distinctive white chest and head. Their breeding season varies according to location, but they often nest in mangroves, making a platform-shaped nest from seaweed and sticks. Both parents help to raise the one to two young. conspicuous, dark eye-stripe, and its narrow, slightly kinked wings. It feeds entirely on fish, plunging from heights of up to 165 ft (50 m) and entering the water feet-first. Its wings are strong, its legs are heavily muscled, and its toes have long, hooked talons and spiny soles—an adaptation that gives it a firm grip on its slippery prey. These birds have been known to take prey that approaches their own weight. They nest in the tops of high trees and hatch a single brood of two to three chicks each year. During the 20th century, ospreys suffered severely as a result of pesticide pollution, particularly from DDT. Their population has now recovered, and in some regions—for example, northern Britain—they have resumed breeding after a gap of many years.
397
398
animal life ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Snowy Sheathbill Chionis alba 131/2 –16 in (34–41 cm)
LENGTH
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Eurasian Oystercatcher Haematopus ostralegus 151/2 –19 in (40–48 cm)
1–13/4 lb (450–775 g)
LENGTH
Rocky coasts, inshore waters, sea ice
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
14–28 oz (400–800 g)
HABITAT
Rocky shores, damp inland habitats
HABITAT
Antarctic Peninsula, subantarctic islands, southern South America, Falkland Islands
DISTRIBUTION
limpets, and other mollusks, using its bill to smash or pry apart their shells. To locate good feeding sites, it often flies along the tideline, calling loudly to other oystercatchers. On coasts, it nests on shingle and gravel, laying two to four camouflaged eggs. The Eurasian oystercatcher is one of 11 species of oystercatchers (family Haematopodidae). All have the same overall shape and brightly colored bills, but in some species, the plumage is totally black.
Iceland, Europe, N. and E. Asia, (breeding); S. Europe, Africa, S. Asia (non-breeding)
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Black-winged Stilt Himantopus himantopus LENGTH 14–16 in (35–40 cm)
5–7 oz (150–200 g)
WEIGHT
Shallow coasts, salt marshes, wetlands
HABITAT
Worldwide except far north and northeast Asia; summer visitor only in north of range
DISTRIBUTION
DISTRIBUTION
Sheathbills are the only birds with non-webbed feet that breed on the shores of Antarctica. Stocky and short-legged, they bear a superficial resemblance to chickens, particularly when they escape from danger by running away. Almost wholly carnivorous, they scavenge carrion along the shoreline, and also loiter around penguin colonies to steal eggs and food from adult birds.
With its bright orange bill and loud piping call, this is one of the most conspicuous waders on European shores. Often seen in small parties, it feeds on mussels,
brightly colored bill
The black-winged stilt’s immensely long legs trail far behind its tail when it flies. It has several geographical races and breeds in a broad range of wetland habitats. It feeds in calm fresh or salt water, striding through the shallows, scything its bill through the water to catch small animals or picking them from the surface.
slender, slightly upturned bill
legs longer than body
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Pied Avocet Recurvirostra avosetta 161/2 –18 in (42–45 cm)
LENGTH
8–14 oz (225–400 g)
WEIGHT
Shallow coasts, salt marshes, wetlands
HABITAT
Europe, temperate Asia (breeding); W. Europe, Africa, S. and S.E. Asia (non-breeding)
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Instantly recognizable by their long upturned bills, avocets are elegant waders that feed in shallow water, both on coasts and inland. There are four species, all similar in shape and size. Of these, the pied avocet is by far the most widespread and is the only species that is found
in Europe and Africa, as well as Asia. Pied avocets feed by dipping their bill in water, and then sweeping it from side to side. The tip of the bill is highly sensitive to touch, so the bird can catch food even in the turbid water of estuaries and lagoons. Pied avocets swim well and sometimes upend to find food in the same way as dabbling ducks. They nest in groups, making cup-shaped hollows on mudflats, where they lay a clutch of four
eggs. Despite their dainty appearance, they can be aggressive if their nests are threatened. Parents charge at intruders with their heads lowered, and they are able to chase away much bulkier birds, such as geese and ducks.
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Gray Plover Pluvialis squatarola LENGTH 10–11 in (26–28 cm)
6–8 oz (170–240 g)
WEIGHT
Arctic tundra, coasts, estuaries
HABITAT
Arctic (breeding); temperate and tropical coasts worldwide (non-breeding)
DISTRIBUTION
This long-distance migrant, one of the most widespread waders, is found on coasts in every continent except Antarctica. In their breeding plumage, seen only in the Arctic tundra, males have a black underside and face, but by the time they head south to winter on coasts, both sexes are a speckled gray. Gray plovers feed on insects in summer and on marine worms and crustaceans in winter.
399 ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Ruddy Turnstone Arenaria interpres LENGTH 8½–10 in (21–25 cm)
3–4 oz (80–110 g)
WEIGHT
Rocky/sandy coasts, coastal lowlands
HABITAT
Arctic coasts (breeding); temperate and tropical coasts worldwide (non-breeding)
DISTRIBUTION
Found on coasts all over the world, the ruddy turnstone feeds in a distinctive way, scuttling along the tideline, flicking stones aside with
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Whimbrel Numenius phaeopus 151/2 –18 in (40–46 cm)
LENGTH
10–16 oz (270–450 g)
WEIGHT
Arctic tundra, coasts, reefs, wetlands
HABITAT
N. Europe, Arctic (breeding); temperate and tropical coasts worldwide (non-breeding) DISTRIBUTION
Using its long, downcurved bill, the whimbrel feeds by probing into wet mud or by extracting animals from rocky crevices. It is one of eight
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Dunlin Calidris alpinus 61/2 –81/2 in (16–22 cm)
LENGTH
11/2 –13/4 oz (40–50 g)
WEIGHT
Coasts, marshes, tundra
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Arctic, subarctic (breeding); temperate and tropical coasts in N. hemisphere (non-breeding)
similar species, collectively known as curlews, that have mottled brown plumage, sharply pointed wings, and bills up to 8 in (20 cm) long. The whimbrel’s bill is only half this length, but it is a precision instrument, with sensitive nerve-endings at its tip that enable the bird to feel for buried food. The whimbrel is strongly migratory, nesting inland across much of the far north, in marshy open country. At this time of the year, the male sings from high in the air, gradually descending on widely spread wings. After breeding, whimbrels head south along coastlines, reaching as far south as the tip of South America and New Zealand.
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Gray Phalarope Phalaropus fulicarius LENGTH 8–9 in (20–22 cm) WEIGHT
2–3 oz (50–75 g)
Marshy coastal tundra, plankton-rich open ocean
HABITAT
a deft movement of its bill. This often reveals sandhoppers and other small animals, which it snaps up or chases. Ruddy turnstones, like many waders, nest in the far north, but their feeding habits restrict them to coastal areas. After breeding, their southward migration takes them to coasts on every continent except Antarctica. plumage than the male. Once she has mated and laid her eggs, she takes no part in incubation or raising the young. By comparison with other waders, gray phalaropes are highly aquatic birds and spend much of their time afloat. They breed close to coasts, and once they have migrated south, they often overwinter far out at sea.
Arctic coasts (breeding); South Atlantic and eastern South Pacific (non-breeding)
DISTRIBUTION
Also known as the red phalarope, this short-billed wader shows a remarkable reversal of roles when it breeds. Unlike most birds, the female—shown here—has a much brighter breeding in a range of habitats from moorland to tundra, often some distance inland. Both parents help to incubate the eggs and raise the young. After breeding, they gather in flocks to migrate to warmer coasts, but rarely travel into the Southern Hemisphere. Other members of this genus include many other flock-forming species, such as the red knot and sanderling, most of which travel as far north as the Arctic Ocean to breed.
7).4%2&,/#+3 7INTERINGWADERSFORMSOMEOFTHE LARGESTBIRDFLOCKSTOBEFOUNDON COASTS&LOCKINGMAKESITHARDERFOR PREDATORSTOAPPROACHUNSEENAND HELPSYOUNGBIRDSTOLOCATEGOOD FEEDINGSITESBYFOLLOWINGADULTS 3OMEWADERS SUCHASTHEPURPLE SANDPIPERANDRUDDYTURNSTONE FREQUENTLYFORMMIXEDFLOCKS AERIAL MANEUVERS
In winter, flocks of dunlins create a breathtaking spectacle, as they wheel in the thousands over coastal feeding grounds. Up close, the dunlin is a typical calidrid wader, one of over two dozen similar species that feed on coasts worldwide. It has a compact body, narrow wings, a tapering tail, and a black, finely pointed bill. Its plumage is variable, but breeding
Flocks of overwintering dunlins show extraordinary coordination, with thousands of birds changing direction almost simultaneously.
males usually have a black patch on the underside, which fades when they molt. Dunlins mainly eat small crustaceans and mollusks that live just beneath the surface of the shore. When feeding, they usually stay close
to the water’s edge, alternately pecking into the mud or sand, and then running forward at high speed. Dunlins breed in the Arctic and subarctic, where they nest
OCEAN LIFE
400
animal life ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Swallow-tailed Gull Creagrus furcatus 211/2 –231/2 in (55–60 cm)
LENGTH
21–32 oz (600–900 g)
WEIGHT
Coasts, inshore waters, open sea
HABITAT
Galápagos Islands and Malpelo Island (breeding); Pacific coast of South America
DISTRIBUTION
Distinguished by its sharply forked tail, this South American gull is atypical in feeding at night. It eats squid and fish, spotting them with its large eyes, which are surrounded by distinctive red rings and angled forward to give a wide field of binocular vision. Swallow-tailed gulls nest on islands and disperse far out to sea during the rest of the year.
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Great Black-backed Gull Larus marinus LENGTH 28–31 in (71–79 cm)
23/4 –43/4 lb (1.2–2.1 kg)
WEIGHT
3#!6%.').'
Rocky coasts, islands, inland in winter
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
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North Atlantic, breeding north
to Svalbard
With a wingspan of up to 51/2 ft (1.7 m), the great black-backed is one of the world’s largest gulls. Heavily built, with black upperwings and a powerful bill, it scavenges food, but it is also a highly predatory bird. It frequently preys on other sea birds and their young, and will attack mammals as large as rabbits. It breeds alone or in colonies, nesting on cliff ledges or on open ground.
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Herring Gull Larus argentatus LENGTH 22–26 in (56–66 cm)
13/4 –23/4 lb (750 g–1.25 kg)
OCEAN LIFE
WEIGHT
Coasts, reservoirs, urban areas
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide in Northern Hemisphere
Noisy, assertive, and always on the lookout for a meal, this is the most widespread gull in the Northern Hemisphere. It has gray upperparts and black wingtips, and a large yellow bill with a conspicuous red spot near the
tip.Young herring gulls are mottled brown, and it takes them three years to develop the full adult plumage. Often seen in flocks, herring gulls are highly adaptable birds, feeding on anything edible that they can find. They rarely venture far out to sea, but their range extends a long way inland, where they are often associated with humans—following tractors to eat earthworms turned up by the plow, or wheeling noisily over garbage dumps. Herring gulls nest on the ground and on rooftops, typically laying three eggs. They can be highly aggressive if their nests are disturbed.
FOOD OVERBOARD
Large numbers of herring gulls follow fishing ships operating close to coasts. Unlike pelagic birds, they usually return to land at night.
birds ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Black-legged Kittiwake Rissa tridactyla 151/2 –18 in (39–46 cm)
LENGTH
11–18 oz (300–500 g)
WEIGHT
Rocky coasts, inshore waters, open sea
HABITAT
Northern hemisphere; breeds north to Svalbard and Greenland
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Laughing Gull Larus atricilla LENGTH 15–17 in (38–43 cm)
11–18 oz (300–500 g)
WEIGHT
HABITAT
Coasts, inshore
waters DISTRIBUTION North America, Caribbean, Central America (breeding); N. South America (non-breeding)
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Ivory Gull Pagophila eburnea 16–18 in (40–46 cm) LENGTH
1–11/4 lb (450–600 g)
WEIGHT
Coasts, open sea, sea ice
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Arctic Ocean, north Atlantic, wintering in south of range
A widespread summer visitor to North American coasts, the laughing gull rarely wanders far inland. It feeds mainly by scavenging and often follows ferries and fishing boats. Bold and self-confident, it is a familiar sight to picnickers on beaches, where it pushes larger gulls aside in the competition to get at food. It nests in large colonies on coasts. Like many dark-headed gulls, it loses its black cap during the non-breeding season, when its head turns a dull white. Completely white, apart from its yellow-tipped bill, black eyes, and black feet, the ivory gull is the world’s most northerly breeding bird. With its buoyant flight and pigeonlike walk, it ranges across open water and sea ice, and it can be found almost anywhere over the Arctic Ocean. It feeds largely by scavenging and is quickly attracted to the carcasses of dead seals and whales. The ivory gull is currently undergoing a steep decline. The reasons for this are unclear.
have longer claws than those of most other gulls, and they build cupshaped nests out of seaweed and mud, which help to keep their eggs secure. Both parents help to incubate the eggs and feed the young, and the adults’ recognition calls can make a deafening noise when several hundred pairs nest close together. After breeding, these birds disperse away from the coast, traveling as far south as tropics off West Africa. They are monogamous, with pairs meeting up again at the same nesting site after spending up to eight months apart.
Kittiwakes get their name from their call—a loud, three-syllable shriek that echoes around their nesting colonies on northern coasts. A medium-sized, gray-backed gull, the black-legged kittiwake breeds on narrow cliff ledges but spends the rest of the year wandering far out to sea. It feeds mainly on small fish, and often follows fishing vessels. Unlike most gulls, however, it rarely shows any interest in scavenging food on land. Black-legged kittiwakes have evolved several adaptations for breeding on bare rock. Their feet
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Brown Noddy Anous stolidus LENGTH 16–18 in (40–45 cm)
7–9 oz (200–250 g)
WEIGHT
Open sea, inshore, oceanic islands
HABITAT
Worldwide in tropical waters; present on some islands year-round
DISTRIBUTION
Noddies are dark, tropical terns that often feed far out to sea. There are three species of noddies and the brown noddy is the largest and most widespread. Brownish black all over, apart from a paler crown, it has slender wings, a long, sharp bill, and small, jet-black legs. Brown noddies feed mainly on fish and squid, hovering and then plunging in the same way as terns. They nest on islands throughout the tropics, making nests from twigs and seaweed in trees or on the ground.
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Caspian Tern
Inca Tern
Sterna caspia
Larosterna inca 19–23 in (48–59 cm)
LENGTH 16–17 in (40–42 cm)
LENGTH
WEIGHT
11/4 –13/4 lb
6–8 oz (175–225 g)
WEIGHT
(550–750 g) Coasts, lakes, reservoirs, gravel pits
Coasts and inshore waters
HABITAT
HABITAT
Pacific coast of South America from Ecuador to central Chile
DISTRIBUTION North America, Eurasia, Africa, Australia (breeding); northern South America, Southeast Asia (non-breeding)
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
White Tern Gygis alba LENGTH 11–13 in (28–33 cm)
31/2 –41/2 oz (100–125 g)
WEIGHT
Open sea, inshore, oceanic islands
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Tropical waters worldwide
Also known as the fairy tern, this delicate and graceful bird wanders far out over tropical oceans, where it is known for its habit of fluttering close to boats. Slim and lightly built, with
black eyes and a straight black bill, it is the only tern whose plumage is entirely white. It spends most of its time flying a few yards above the surface, periodically dropping down in order to catch small fish and squid. Unlike most terns, it is a solitary breeder, nesting on widely scattered islands. It lays its single egg on a rocky ledge, or in a slight hollow in a sloping branch. The parents take turns cradling the egg throughout its five-week incubation period—an unusually long time for an egg of its size. The chick emerges with strong feet and claws for clinging to its nesting site.
With its curling white “mustache” plumes, this South American tern is easy to identify. It feeds in the cold, nutrient-rich waters of the Humboldt Current, dipping down to the surface to catch small fish. Inca terns often follow sea lions and whales, preying on shoals of fish as they try to escape the larger predators. They nest among rocks or in abandoned burrows.
OCEAN LIFE
Despite its name, this large, blackcrested tern has a global distribution. Gray-backed, with a large, dark red bill, it has a black cap that is darkest when it breeds. It plunge-dives for food in shallow water, and nests in colonies, laying its eggs directly on gravel or mud.
401
402
animal life ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Black Skimmer
Arctic Skua
Rynchops niger
Stercorarius parasiticus LENGTH
16–20 in (40–50 cm)
LENGTH 18–26 in (46–65 cm)
WEIGHT
9–14 oz (250–400 g)
WEIGHT
Estuaries, lagoons, lakes, coasts
HABITAT
14–21 oz (400–600 g)
Coasts, tundra, moorland, open sea
HABITAT
Pacific and Atlantic coasts of North, Central, and South America, north to Massachusetts
DISTRIBUTION
Similar to terns in overall shape, skimmers have remarkable and highly distinctive bills. The lower part, or mandible, of the bill is at least a third longer than the upper part and is laterally compressed, giving it a shape like a scissor blade. When feeding, a skimmer flies low over calm water with its lower mandible slicing through the surface. If the mandible
touches food, the skimmer snaps its bill shut, flicking its catch into its mouth. The black skimmer is one of three species of skimmers, all of which are dark above, with white underparts. Like its relatives, it often feeds at dawn and dusk, and it will also feed during the night if the moonlight is bright enough. It lives in small flocks and nests on beaches and sand spits, laying its eggs in an unlined hollow on the ground. It is migratory in the far north and south of its range.
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Great Skua Stercorarius skua LENGTH 20–26 in (51–66 cm)
23/4 –31/2 lb (1.2–1.6 kg)
WEIGHT
Coasts, inshore waters, open sea
HABITAT
North Atlantic (breeding), dispersing south to equator (non-breeding)
DISTRIBUTION
Powerfully built, with short, broad wings, the great skua is shaped like an unusually thickset gull, but it has mottled, dark brown plumage that changes only slightly as it matures. It is a rapacious predator, eating fish, small mammals, and also other birds, as well as raiding nests for eggs and chicks. Normally slow and ponderous in the air, it becomes swift and agile when it hunts, and chases birds as large as gannets to force them to regurgitate their food, which it then eats. The great skua nests on the ground and spends the rest of the year at sea.
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Common Murre Uria aalge LENGTH 151/2 –161/2 in (39–42 cm)
13/4 –21/2 lb (850 g–1.1 kg)
WEIGHT
Inshore waters, rocky coasts, open sea
HABITAT
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
North Atlantic, north Pacific
Conspicuously marked in brownish black and gleaming white, the common murre spends most of the year at sea. It dives for fish from the surface, swimming underwater using its wings. In spring, common murres crowd together on narrow cliff ledges, where each female lays a single egg directly on to the rock. When the chick is fully grown, the male parent escorts it into the sea.
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Northern waters (breeding); throughout Southern Hemisphere (non-breeding)
DISTRIBUTION
This slender-winged sea bird, also called the parasitic or Arctic jaeger, is exceptionally fast and maneuverable in the air—a skill that is central to the
way it feeds. There are several color forms, which differ in their proportion of brown and gray, but all have streamers that give their tails a sharp central point. This species catches fish, but it is better known as a kleptoparasite, which steals food from other birds. It swoops down on gulls and terns as they return from the sea, chasing them and often gripping their tail feathers with its bill. Its victims react by disgorging food, which the skua deftly intercepts in midair. Arctic skuas also hunt small land animals and steal eggs and chicks from nests. They nest on the ground and winter at sea.
403 ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Atlantic Puffin Fratercula arctica LENGTH 11–12 in (28–30 cm)
14 oz (400 g)
WEIGHT
Inshore waters, rocky coasts, open sea
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION North Atlantic, breeding north to Greenland and Svalbard
HUMAN IMPACT
With its vividly marked bill, bright red feet, and red-and-black eye patches, this is the most colorful sea bird in the north Atlantic. Like other members of the auk family, it feeds by pursuing fish underwater, using its strong, stubby wings to swim. In the air, it flies rapidly on fast-beating wings, skimming over the waves as it returns to its nest with food. Atlantic puffins breed in large clifftop colonies, digging burrows in coastal turf. The parents take turns incubating the single egg, and they both help to feed the developing nestling. Instead of
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
Least Auklet Aethia pusilla LENGTH
6 in (15 cm)
WEIGHT
3 oz (85 g)
Inshore waters, rocky coasts, open sea
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION North Pacific, breeding mainly in the Aleutian Islands and islands in Bering Sea
regurgitating food, as most sea birds do, they return with small fish held in their bills, carrying about six fish simultaneously, arranged alternately head to tail. Each nestling is fed continuously for about six weeks, after which the parents abandon it and head out to sea. After going without food for several days, the young bird crawls out of the burrow and flutters down to the sea after dark. Puffins disperse out to sea in fall, when they lose the bright bill colors that make them so conspicuous during the summer months. This tiny bird is probably the most abundant species of auk, a family that also includes murres and puffins. Short, plump, and gray-backed, with a stubby red-tipped bill, it nests in vast colonies off the Alaskan coast, some of which contain more than a million birds. Least auklets also feed together, floating on the surface in large gatherings known as “rafts.” They are pursuit divers that eat mainly zooplankton.
Crested Auklet Aethia cristatella 91/2–101/2 in (24–27 cm)
LENGTH
9 oz (250 g)
Inshore waters, rocky coasts, open sea
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION North Pacific, breeding mainly in the Aleutian Islands and islands in Bering Sea
UNFAIR SHARES
A catch of sand eels is brought aboard a boat. These finger-shaped fish, unrelated to true eels, are an important food for some fish and sea birds.
ORDER CORACIIFORMES
Pied Kingfisher Ceryle rudis LENGTH
10 in (25 cm)
WEIGHT
31/4 oz (90 g)
single band. Pairs nest in burrows in sandy banks and are often helped by the previous year’s young to collect food for the nestlings. The adults have a loud, high-pitched call, which may be heard as they speed past.
Coasts, lagoons, estuaries, rivers, marshes
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Africa, Middle East, south Asia
ORDER CORACIIFORMES
Collared Kingfisher Todirhamphus chloris
and noisy, as they throw back their heads and make loud grunts and trumpeting sounds. When the breeding season is over, they disperse out to sea and spend the winter as far south as Japan.
LENGTH
11 in (28 cm)
WEIGHT
41/2 oz (120 g)
Forests, coasts, beaches, mangrove swamps, estuaries
HABITAT
Red Sea, Persian Gulf, Southeast Asia, Australasia
DISTRIBUTION
Also known as the mangrove kingfisher, this bird lives in a variety of habitats, although in Australia it is restricted to the coast. Greenish blue above, with a white belly and collar, it has a black eye-stripe and a sharply pointed bill. On coasts, it hunts crabs as well as fish and, like all kingfishers except the pied (see above), beats its prey against a perch before swallowing it. It often nests in hollows in mangrove trees, and lays three or four eggs. In the far south of its range, this bird is a summer visitor only.
OCEAN LIFE
The north Pacific is home to more species of auks than anywhere else. The crested auklet is a typical example, with a compact body, sootygray plumage, and a feathery crest that curves forward from its forehead over its orange-red bill. Like other auks, it flies low on rapidly whirring wings and feeds in flocks so dense that they resemble swarms of insects wheeling over the water. Crested auklets breed among fallen rocks on island coasts, in colonies containing thousands of birds. Their courtship displays are energetic
4HEPUFFINPOPULATIONHASFALLEN SHARPLYOFLATE ESPECIALLYINTHE EASTERN!TLANTIC4HISMAYBEDUE TOTHEGROWINGFISHERYFORSAND EELS AFISHTHATPUFFINSRELYON ESPECIALLYINBREEDINGSEASON3AND EELSAREUSEDINFERTILIZERS ANIMAL FOODS ANDASASOURCEOFEDIBLEOIL
This boldly patterned, black-andwhite bird is the only kingfisher that regularly fishes offshore. Instead of watching for prey from a perch, as many other kingfisher species do, it flies rapidly above the surface with its head facing down as it scans the water below. If it spots food, it hovers on the spot, and then dives down to make a catch. It can also eat while in flight, another unique adaptation. Male and female pied kingfishers look similar, although the female has a double breast band compared to the male’s
ORDER CHARADRIIFORMES
WEIGHT
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animal life
MAMMALS DOMAIN Eucarya KINGDOM Animalia PHYLUM Chordata CLASS Mammalia ORDERS 27 SPECIES 5,000
ONLY A SMALL MINORITY OF THE WORLD’S mammals live in seawater, but taken together, they show an extraordinary range of shapes, sizes, and lifestyles. They include cetaceans (whales and dolphins), sirenians (manatees and dugongs), and carnivores, particularly the pinniped carnivores (seals, sea lions, and walruses). All marine mammals breathe air, like their terrestrial counterparts, and they give birth to live young, either in the sea or onshore. Many species are migratory, with a sophisticated navigational sense. heart beats rapidly after surfacing
ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY 180 160 140
HEART RATE
Marine mammals have many adaptations for life at sea, DIVING MAMMAL not only in their anatomy, but also in their physiology, When a harbor seal dives, its heart rate regulating how their bodies work. Cetaceans and falls below 10 beats a sirenians have lost all visible traces of hind limbs; minute. Blood diverted instead, they propel themselves with their tail flippers from its muscles and digestive system flows or flukes, which beat up and down. Fur seals and sea lions swim with their front flippers, while true seals use to its heart and brain. their rear flippers, bringing them together like a pair of hands. Despite needing to breathe air, many marine mammals are superb divers. Some, such as the elephant seal, can reach depths of over 3,300 ft (1,000 m) and stay underwater for up to two hours. When they dive, their heart rate drops, and blood flow is modified so that vital organs receive enough oxygen until they resurface. Instead of breathing in before they dive, the deepest divers often exhale. This helps them to avoid decompression sickness, or “the bends.”
heart rate drops as seal dives
120 100 80 60
rate remains low throughout dive
40 20 0
2
4
6
TIME (minutes)
humerus
radius
phalange
SHARED PATTERNS
A sea lion’s front flipper has the same arrangement of bones as a human arm. The “arm” bones are short and sturdy, helping to bear the animal’s bulk on land. Long finger bones make up the flipper’s blade.
ulna
blowhole
INSULATING BLUBBER FLIPPERS AND FLUKES
A humpback whale’s flippers contain bones, and beat like a pair of wings. Its flukes, or tail fins, are made of rubbery tissue, and contain no bones at all.
Compared to air, seawater drains much more heat from mammals’ bodies. To keep warm, many polar species, such as this walrus, have a thick layer of ear drum insulating fat, called blubber, sound channel under the skin. in jaw
VARIED DIET
OCEAN LIFE
Penguins are just one item on the leopard seal’s menu. Despite its reputation for ferocity, at least half of its diet consists of krill, which it filters with its cheek teeth.
scapula
metacarpal sonic lips (source of sound) outgoing clicks (to prey)
melon incoming (reflected) clicks
USING ECHOLOCATION
Dolphins and toothed whales use pulses of high-pitched sound to locate prey. The forehead contains an oil-filled organ called the melon, which is thought to function as an “acoustic lens” to focus outgoing sound.
FEEDING Apart from plant-eating manatees and dugongs, most marine mammals are exclusively carnivorous. In open water, many pursue individual prey, tracking it by sight or by echolocation. Some seals have a twin strategy. They catch prey individually, but they can also filter out planktonic animals in bulk, using complex cheek teeth that interlock to form a sieve. This efficient feeding method reaches extremes in the baleen whales, which cruise through shoals of fish or krill, often swallowing over 200 lb (100 kg) of food at a time. Not all marine mammals catch moving prey. Sea otters dive to collect clams, mussels, and sea urchins, while walruses and gray whales suck mollusks out of seabed sediment.
mammals
405
BREEDING Marine mammals typically produce a single young each time they breed. Cetaceans and sirenians give birth in water, as do sea otters, but all other marine mammals have to return to land. In species with a harem system, such as fur seals and elephant seals, fighting between rival males for control of mates can be ferocious. After mating, the females of most marine mammals raise their young on their own. For their size, true seals develop fastest, some being weaned in as little as five days. At the other end of the spectrum, a dolphin calf may suckle for over 20 months—the start of a mother–calf bond that can last for six years. SEA OTTER PUP
A young sea otter rides on its mother’s chest, while she floats in calm water. The pup depends on her for at least five months.
HUMAN IMPACT
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COLONY BREEDING
ENGRAVED WHALE TOOTH
Many seals and sea lions, such as these South American sea lions, are highly sociable in the breeding season, forming large colonies on beaches to mate and have their pups.
The art of scrimshaw, or engraving on whale teeth and walrus tusks, was popular among whalers during the 17th and 18th centuries. Whalebone carving still takes place in areas where small-scale native whaling is permitted.
MARINE MAMMAL CLASSIFICATION Two orders of mammals—the cetaceans and sirenians—are wholly marine. Seals and sea lions are also aquatic, but like other members of the carnivore order, they give birth on land. Several other carnivore species feed at sea, but of these only the sea otter is entirely marine. CARNIVORES Order Carnivora Most carnivores are terrestrial, but a few spend some of their lives in the sea. The polar bear is equally at home on dry land, on sea ice, and in salt water. Seven species of otters often enter salt water, but the sea otter is the only one to spend all of its time offshore. The most fully aquatic carnivores
85 species
Cetaceans are divided into two suborders. The 13 baleen whales lack teeth, and filter food from the water using a fibrous material called baleen. The 72 toothed whales are predators that hunt individual prey. Cetaceans give birth at sea, and are helpless if stranded on land. SIRENIANS Order Sirenia 4 species
Living mainly in the tropics, sirenians, or sea cows, are barrel-shaped vegetarians that live
in salt and fresh water. They include the dugong and three species of manatees, such as the Caribbean manatee, below. Slowmoving and thick-skinned, sirenians have broad muzzles, paddlelike front flippers, and a broad, horizontally flattened tail.
OCEAN LIFE
293 species
are the 34 species of pinnipeds, until recently classified in their own order, the Pinnipedia. They are split into three families. One family comprises the sea lions and fur seals, which have external ears, use their forelimbs for propulsion, and use all four flippers to move on land. The second family is composed of the true seals, which lack external ears, use hind limbs for propulsion, and are less mobile on land. The final family contains only the walrus, which has very wrinkled skin and long tusks.
CETACEANS Order Cetacea
406
animal life
ORDER CARNIVORA
Polar Bear Ursus maritimus LENGTH
Up to 8 ft (2.5 m)
Females up to 650 lb (300 kg); males up to 1,750 lb (800 kg)
WEIGHT
thick fur over layer of blubber for insulation
Arctic tundra, pack ice, open sea
HABITAT
Circumpolar in the Arctic, southward as far as Newfoundland and the Pribilof Islands
DISTRIBUTION
large paws, furred on both sides
ORDER CARNIVORA
Sea Otter Enhydra lutris 21/4 –51/4 ft (0.7–1.6 m) including tail LENGTH
33–100 lb (15–45 kg)
WEIGHT
Inshore waters along rocky coasts
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
North Pacific from Japan to Alaska
and California
Unlike other otters, the sea otter is able to spend its whole life in the ocean. It has a blunt head, a stocky body, webbed rear feet, and small front paws with sharp claws. It uses these to gather food and pick up large stones. At the surface, it floats on its back, using a stone that rests on its chest as an anvil to smash open its prey. Sea otters feed on mollusks, sea urchins, and crabs.While they can dive to 130 ft (40 m), they rarely venture more than 1/2 mile (1 km) from the shore.
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Icon of the Arctic, the polar bear is the largest mammalian carnivore and has incomparable stamina, resilience, and power. Its body is streamlined, the head grading almost imperceptibly
ORDER CARNIVORA
Marine Otter Lontra felina LENGTH Up to 3 ft (95 cm) including tail WEIGHT
9–13 lb (4–6 kg)
HABITAT
Exposed rocky
shores DISTRIBUTION Pacific coast of South America from Peru to Cape Horn
This lithe predator lives on some of the world’s stormiest coastlines, particularly in the remote southern part of its range. The marine otter’s closest relatives live mainly in fresh
ORDER CARNIVORA
European Otter Lutra lutra LENGTH 3–31/2 ft (90– 110 cm) including tail
15–22 lb (7–10 kg)
WEIGHT
Rivers, lakes, estuaries, rocky coasts
HABITAT
Temperate and tropical Eurasia, south to Indonesia
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
into a long, powerful neck. Its huge paws may be over 12 in (30 cm) wide and are furred on their undersides, providing grip while retaining body heat. Its hearing and sense of smell are acute: it can hear prey that is under 3 ft (1 m) or more of ice and can smell carrion 3 miles (5 km) away. Polar bears spend most of the year at sea, roaming the drifting pack ice and swimming across open areas. Naturally buoyant, they can swim for hours, although they hunt mainly on the ice. The main prey of polar bears is seals, often caught at breathing holes. They also eat sea birds and fish, and the corpses of beached whales are a favorite food. During the summer, many of them live on land and eat a wider range of food, from reindeer to berries. Females give birth in winter, suckling their cubs in a den dug in the snow. For centuries, the polar bear has been hunted by native peoples of the Arctic, without its numbers declining. However, thinning of the Arctic’s seaice by global warming could seriously reduce its access to food. water, but it spends almost all its time in the sea. Like typical river otters, this coast-dwelling otter has short brownish yellow fur, webbed toes on all four feet, and sensitive whiskers that help it to find prey. It fishes along rocky coasts, in the rich waters of the Humboldt Current, and instead of making burrows, it shelters in sea caves just above the level of the highest tides. Marine otters have long been hunted for their pelts, and current estimates of the population are as low as 1,000 animals. The species is now protected, but preservation of its habitat may be equally important in guaranteeing its long-term survival.
Once widespread throughout Europe and Asia, the European otter has been badly affected by pollution and habitat change and by being hunted for its fur. It has a streamlined body, short but dense coat, and webbing on all four paws, and is extraordinarily agile underwater, twisting and turning to catch fish. Inland, European otters are largely nocturnal, spending the daytime in their dens, or holts. Those that live on the coast, however, can often be seen during the day.
mammals ORDER CARNIVORA
ORDER CARNIVORA
Antarctic Fur Seal
Northern Fur Seal
Arctocephalus gazella
Callorhinus ursinus
LENGTH
5–61/2 ft (1.5–2 m)
LENGTH
41/2 –7 ft (1.4–2.1 m)
WEIGHT
110–350 lb (50–160 kg)
WEIGHT
Rocky coasts, open sea in polar waters
HABITAT
110–600 lb (50–270 kg)
Coasts and sea in cold-water regions
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Southern Ocean
DISTRIBUTION
North Pacific, Bering Sea
Of the nine species of fur seals, most live in the Southern Hemisphere; this is the only northern species that exists in significant numbers. Like other fur seals, it has a thick, dark coat, external ears, and long front flippers that it uses for swimming and for moving around on land. Males can be five times heavier than females, but both sexes have short muzzles, giving them a characteristic
407
snub-nosed look. Their large eyes allow them to see at night, which is when they do most of their feeding, as their prey is closer to the surface. They feed mainly on fish, but also on squid and sea birds, and migrate far out into the Pacific after they breed. Most northern fur seals breed on islands in the Bering Sea. Decimated by commercial hunters from the mid-1700s onward, they are now protected by hunting controls.
Ranging further south than any other fur seal, this polar species feeds on fish, squid, and krill in the icy waters off Antarctica. In spring it comes ashore after spending winter at sea. Males are up to three times heavier than females, with an imposing mane and thickened neck that gives them a front-heavy appearance. This species breeds on islands, such as South Georgia and Kerguelen, and is rising in number. This may be a side effect of the whaling industry, which has reduced competition for krill.
ORDER CARNIVORA
ORDER CARNIVORA
South American Fur Seal
California Sea Lion Zalophus californianus
Arctocephalus australis LENGTH
61/2 –81/4 ft (2–2.5 m)
LENGTH
41/2 –61/4
ft
240–880 lb (110–400 kg)
WEIGHT
(1.4–1.9 m) 130–440 lb (60–200 kg)
WEIGHT
Coasts and sea in cold-water regions
HABITAT
Pacific and Atlantic coasts of southern South America, Falkland Islands
Rocky coasts and open sea
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Pacific coast of the US, Galápagos
Islands
DISTRIBUTION
Once found along the entire length of South America’s southern coasts, this fur seal now breeds on offshore islands, where it faces less disturbance from humans. It is blackish gray, with paler undersides in females, and is agile on land, using its flippers to climb steep rocks. Males may be about three times the weight of females. This species feeds mainly at night, hunting fish, squid, lobsters, and crabs, and is itself hunted by sharks and killer whales.
Famed for its acrobatic antics in marine aquariums, the California sea lion is just as agile in the wild. Its sleek body is covered with short fur, which ranges in color from brownish black in males to light brown in females and young; mature males may be more than three times as heavy as females and have a distinctive bony hump on their heads. They feed on fish and squid.
ORDER CARNIVORA
Walrus Odobenus rosmarus LENGTH 101/4 –111/2 ft (3.1–3.5 m)
2,750–3,750 lb (1,250–1,700 kg)
WEIGHT
Coasts and shallow open water
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Arctic Ocean, Bering Sea, Hudson Bay
OCEAN LIFE
Instantly recognizable by its tusks, the walrus is the second-largest pinniped after the elephant seals. Its skin is unlike any other mammal’s, with deep creases and wrinkles, but very little hair. Its color varies enormously: young walruses can be very dark, while old individuals are sometimes a mottled pink. Beneath the skin is a thick layer of fat, or blubber, which keeps their bodies warm. Walruses feed
on shellfish, which they find in the seabed sediment at depths of up to 165 ft (50 m). They locate their food mainly by touch, using stiff whiskers that resemble a mustache. At one time, it was thought that they used their tusks to dredge up their food, but it is now known that they uncover it by squirting water with their mouths. Once their prey has been uncovered, they separate the soft parts from the shells. It is unclear how they do this, but their feeding technique probably involves suction rather than crushing, because intact shells are often found around their breathing holes. Females give birth to a single calf after a 15-month gestation, and they breed only every other year. Walruses are highly gregarious, making them easy prey for hunters. They have been hunted by indigenous peoples for at least 15,000 years, both for food and for their hides.
408
animal life ORDER CARNIVORA
Common Seal Phoca vitulina 43/5–61/4 ft (1.4–1.9 m)
LENGTH
120–375 lb (55–170 kg)
WEIGHT
Inshore waters, estuaries, rivers
HABITAT
North Pacific and north Atlantic, reaching as far south as Baja California
DISTRIBUTION
Also known as the harbor seal, this species has the widest distribution of any seal and the widest variety of markings. Its background color ranges from pale gray to brown, with dark spots and rings and sometimes a dark stripe along the back. It has a smoothly domed head and a doglike muzzle. It feeds primarily on fish, often catching them in shallow water close to the shore. It dives
for up to five minutes, but rarely to any great depth. The common seal spends much of its time on rock flats and sandbanks, and it is here that the females give birth. The pups shed their soft natal coat before they are born, starting life with a dark version of the adult coat, unlike the pups of some other seals. Although they can swim almost immediately, they often use their front flippers to ride on their mother’s back. They are weaned at about four weeks. True to their name, common seals are still abundant, but in the North Sea they have been adversely affected by pollution, and also by a highly infectious viral disease that broke out in the late 1980s.
ORDER CARNIVORA
Ringed Seal Pusa hispida 41/4–5 ft (1.3–1.5 m)
LENGTH
100–210 lb (45–95 kg)
WEIGHT
Polar waters around sea ice
HABITAT
Arctic Ocean, north Pacific, north Atlantic, Baltic Sea, Sea of Okhotsk
DISTRIBUTION
Named after its conspicuous circular markings, the ringed seal is found throughout the Arctic, in open water near sea ice and also under the ice
ORDER CARNIVORA
Gray Seal Halichoerus grypus 6–71/2 ft (1.8–2.3 m)
LENGTH
550–880 lb (250–400 kg)
WEIGHT
Rocky coasts, offshore islands
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Discontinuous populations in northwest Atlantic, Iceland, British Isles, Baltic Sea
clawed front flipper
ORDER CARNIVORA
Harp Seal Pagophilus groenlandicus 51/2–61/4 ft (1.7–1.9 m)
LENGTH
265–310 lb (120–140 kg)
WEIGHT
HABITAT
Polar waters
North Atlantic and adjoining regions of the Arctic Ocean, extending eastward to Siberia
DISTRIBUTION
One of the most common seals in the far north, the harp seal is born with an exceptionally luxurious coat of long white fur, which camouflages the pups as they lie on sea ice. Adult harp seals are silvery-gray with a mottled pattern
of dark patches, which become more prominent as they age. They feed mainly on fish and shrimp, living on the southern edge of the Arctic pack ice, and resting on it when they molt. In early spring, adult females give birth to a single pup each, which they wean after just 12 days. At this point, the pup gradually sheds its white coat and takes up life in the sea. For many decades, the pups have been the subject of a controversial hunt, which supplies their pelts to the fur trade. Despite campaigns by conservationists, over 250,000 pups are still culled every year. Harp seals are also hunted by sharks, polar bears, and killer whales.
three times heavier than females— a difference exceeded by few other true seals. When not hunting for their usual diet of fish, gray seals spend their time either resting on rocks or “bottling”—sleeping in the water with their bodies vertical and their nostrils just above the surface. They breed onshore, hauling themselves out onto beaches or grass farther inland. Their pups have a white natal coat, and they stay onshore for two to three months before venturing into the sea.
The gray seal has a distinctive convex muzzle, which gives it a “Romannosed” appearance. Adults vary in color: males are usually gray overall, with pale patches on their undersides, while females often have a marbled pattern of dark patches over a much lighter background. Males may be two or
ORDER CARNIVORA
Mediterranean Monk Seal OCEAN LIFE
itself, where it digs breathing holes. It can dive for over an hour, feeding on fish and zooplankton. Female ringed seals breed on the ice, where they dig dens in the snow. These seals are a favorite prey of polar bears, which hunt them in their dens and when they surface to breathe.
Monachus monachus 81/4–9 ft (2.5–2.7 m)
LENGTH
550–660 lb (250–300 kg)
WEIGHT
Rocky coasts in warm-water regions
HABITAT
Atlantic coast of North Africa, Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION
Both of the two species of Monachus seals are endangered. The larger of the two, the Mediterranean monk seal, is listed by the IUCN as critically endangered. Its coat varies from dark brown to light tan. Females are larger than males, and the pups, unusually for seals, are born with black fur. This seal was once common, but centuries of hunting and disturbance have reduced its population to a few hundred. Most exist in the Mediterranean, but the largest colony is on the Atlantic coast of Morocco. Its closest living relative is the rare Hawaiian monk seal.
mammals ORDER CARNIVORA
Northern Elephant Seal Mirounga angustirostris LENGTH
10–161/2 ft
(3–5 m) 2,000–6,000 lb (900–2,700 kg)
WEIGHT
Islands in deep water off rocky coasts
HABITAT
Pacific coast of North America, from San Francisco to Baja California
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER CARNIVORA
Weddell Seal Leptonychotes weddellii 81/4–91/2 ft (2.5–2.9 m)
LENGTH
880–1,300 lb (400–600 kg)
WEIGHT
Polar waters around sea ice
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Southern Ocean, extending northward to South Georgia
The Weddell seal is found around the entire coast of Antarctica and is the world’s most southerly marine mammal. Its head looks small in
409
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Male elephant seals are the largest of all pinnipeds, and the colossal males dwarf the females. There are two species, one in each hemisphere. They are very similar in appearance and have similar life histories. The northern elephant seal is gray or brown, with no obvious markings. The male has a huge, muscular neck, powerful jaws, and an inflatable proboscis resembling a shortened
trunk. Both sexes have a layer of insulating blubber and a short, stiff coat, without any soft underfur. They are superb divers: the northern species has been tracked to depths of over 1 mile (1.6 km). They eat squid and deep-water fish, although it is still not clear exactly how they find their prey.
With its long muzzle and sharply constricted neck, this solitary predator looks very different from other seal species found off Antarctica. Unlike most true seals, it propels itself forward through the water with its front flippers rather than its rear ones— a characteristic that it shares with fur seals and sea lions. Its body is black or dark gray with a silvery underside, marked with darker flecks and spots. Its jaws are exceptionally powerful, with an unusually wide gape, and they are armed with long incisors and
canine teeth, as well as elaborate cheek teeth that can strain food from the water. About half of the leopard seal’s diet consists of krill, but the remainder is made up of much larger animals that it hunts individually. For example, leopard seals are adept at catching penguins as they enter the water, throwing them into the air to rip the skin and feathers from their bodies. They also prey on squid, fish, and other seals. Females give birth to a single pup each year, weaning it at the age of four weeks.
proportion to its body, and it has a short, dense coat of bluish black fur, with light streaks on the sides. It feeds mainly on fish, diving to depths of 2,000 ft (600 m), and is able to stay underwater for up to an hour. Weddell seals are so well adapted to life in cold water that they bask on ice in preference to bare ground. They breed on ice, and their winter survival depends on keeping open their breathing holes. They gouge these out with their canine teeth, starting when the ice is thin, and maintaining them as the ice thickens, to depths of up to 61/2 ft (2 m).
ORDER CARNIVORA
Crabeater Seal Lobodon carcinophagus 61/2–8 ft (2–2.4 m)
LENGTH
440–660 lb (200–300 kg)
WEIGHT
Polar waters around sea ice
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Southern Ocean and adjoining regions north of the Antarctic Convergence
ORDER CARNIVORA
Leopard Seal Hydrurga leptonyx 81/2–101/2 ft (2.5–3.2 m)
LENGTH
440–1,000 lb (200–450 kg)
WEIGHT
Polar waters, rocky coasts
HABITAT
Southern Ocean and adjoining regions north of the Antarctic Convergence
DISTRIBUTION
OCEAN LIFE
Despite its name, this seal feeds only on krill and other planktonic animals. It filters water using its strange molar teeth, which have elongated cusps that look like a set of stubby fingers. When its jaws close, the cusps act like a sieve, letting water out but keeping food in. Crabeater seals have slender bodies, with fur that may be light or dark brown and darker flippers. They live close to pack ice and breed on it, and they are extremely nimble on land. Their mummified remains have been found over 30 miles (50 km) inland in Antarctica’s Dry Valleys. Their total population is thought to be 10–20 million, making them more numerous than all other seal species combined.
GRAY SEAL
In the northeast Atlantic, gray seals give birth to their young in fall (September to October), while the western Atlantic population give birth in winter (January to February). Having spent the first months of its life on land, this juvenile from the eastern population has shed its pup fur and gone to sea in search of fish.
412
animal life ORDER CETACEA
Northern Right Whale Eubalaena glacialis LENGTH 43–56 ft (13–17 m)
33–88 tons (30–80 metric tons)
DEPTH
Temperate and subpolar waters
HABITAT
Northwestern Atlantic, vestigial populations in northeastern Atlantic and Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
The northern right whale was one of the first whales to be hunted commercially and is now one of the most critically endangered species,
with a total population of about 500 individuals. A deep bluish black, apart from white markings on its belly, it has a deeply arched mouth, with a lower jaw shaped like a gigantic scoop. Its head its covered with distinctive areas of hard pale skin, known as callosities, which scientists use to identify individuals. Like all baleen whales, it feeds by filtering food from seawater, using brushlike strips of baleen that hang from its upper jaw. Northern right whales feed at high latitudes, but they migrate to warmer waters to breed. An almost identical species, the southern right whale, is found in the Southern Hemisphere. Unlike its northern counterpart, its numbers are gradually increasing and are currently estimated to be about 5,000.
HUMAN IMPACT
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EXPANDEDOPERATIONSTO#ANADAIN THES4HESPERMWHALEWAS THEQUARRYOF!MERICANWHALERSIN THE0ACIFICFROMTHES-ODERN WHALING TARGETINGSPECIESSUCHAS THEBLUEWHALE EXPANDEDRAPIDLYIN THETHCENTURY USINGFACTORY SHIPSANDEXPLOSIVEHARPOONS WHALING STATION
Hauled ashore in the Southern Ocean, a whale is flensed, or stripped of its blubber and flesh.
ORDER CETACEA
ORDER CETACEA
Bowhead Whale
Gray Whale
Balaena mysticetus
Eschrichtius robustus LENGTH
45–60 ft (14–18 m)
40–50 ft (12–15 m)
WEIGHT
55–65 tons (50–60 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Polar and subpolar waters
HABITAT
LENGTH
17–39 tons (15–35 metric tons)
Temperate and subpolar coastal waters
HABITAT
Arctic Ocean, Bering Sea, adjoining regions of north Atlantic and north Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
Named after its arching lower jaw, the bowhead has the longest baleen plates of any whale at up to 15 ft (4.5 m). Grayish black with a paler chin, it has a huge head in proportion to its body and remarkably thick blubber, which insulates it in near-freezing water. Bowheads can break upward through ice over 12 in (30 cm) thick, allowing them to maintain open water holes throughout the Arctic winter.
Unlike other baleen whales, the gray whale feeds on the sea floor, filtering animals out of the sediment. Its body is gray with white mottling, and it has a narrowish head, with yellowish baleen plates up
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION
North Pacific, Bering Sea,
Arctic Ocean
to 16 in (40 cm) long. Its entire body is often heavily encrusted with barnacles and whale lice. Although gray whales stay close to the coast, they carry out record-breaking migrations. On the west coast of North America, large numbers migrate between the Bering Sea and Baja California in Mexico, a round trip of up to 12,400 miles (20,000 km). Unfortunately, their coast-hugging habits make them easy prey for whalers. By the mid-1900s, they had been almost wiped out, but legal protection has allowed their numbers to recover.
ORDER CETACEA
Humpback Whale Megaptera novaeangliae LENGTH 40–50 ft (12–15 m)
27–33 tons (25–30 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Open oceans, from subpolar to tropical
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide, except extreme north
and south
The humpback’s lively behavior makes it a favorite with whalewatchers. This whale has a blue-black body, deeply notched tail fins (flukes) and extremely long, winglike flippers. Its flukes and flippers are often splashed with white markings—the pattern, unique as a fingerprint, is used to identify individuals. Unlike most baleen whales, humpbacks often trap their prey by lunging upward from below. To concentrate shoals of fish or krill, they often spiral around them while exhaling air. This “bubblenetting” may be carried out by several individuals working as a team. Humpbacks spend the summer in cold, food-rich waters, moving to lower latitudes to give birth in winter. They often feed near coasts. Although protected, current humpback populations are about a fifth of those of pre-whaling days.
413 ORDER CETACEA
Minke Whale Balaenoptera acutorostrata LENGTH 23–33 ft (7–10 m)
5–11 tons (5–10 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Open ocean and coastal waters
HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide, except extreme north
and south
This is the smallest of the rorquals— a name given to baleen whales that have expandable, pleated throats. It is also the most numerous, with a global population as high as 1 million. Like its much larger relative, the blue whale, it has a torpedo-shaped body with a single dorsal fin set far back, toward its tail. It is gray or brown above, with a paler underside, and short, pointed flippers that may have a white band. Minke whales live alone or in small groups. They are naturally inquisitive and regularly approach boats. They eat small fish and planktonic animals and, like other rorquals, they feed mainly in coldwater regions, eating much less during the breeding season, when they migrate toward the tropics. The minke is the only rorqual that is still hunted commercially, despite a moratorium observed by most member countries of the International Whaling Commission (IWC).
7(!,%3/.' OCEAN LIFE
,IKEALLWHALES MATUREMALEHUMPBACKSUSE SOUNDTOCOMMUNICATE4HEYPRODUCETHELONGEST MOSTCOMPLEXSOUNDSEQUENCESOFANYANIMAL WITHEACHªSONG«LASTINGUPTOMINUTES4HE SONGISHEARDMILESAWAYBYOTHERHUMPBACKS %ACHREGIONALPOPULATIONHASITSOWNSONG SUNG ONLYINTHEBREEDINGSEASON4OSING THEWHALE VIBRATESAIRINSIDEITSELF BUTEXACTLYHOWISNOT KNOWN BECAUSEWHALESHAVENOVOCALCORDS
HUMPBACK WHALE
In common with all baleen whales, the humpback whale has large jaws and a long head in relation to the rest of its body. It has widely spaced throat grooves and knoblike projections on the upper and lower jaws. Despite its great size, it is an energetic swimmer and often breaches spectacularly.
416
animal Life ORDER CETACEA
Blue Whale Balaenoptera musculus 80–90 ft (24–27 m) LENGTH
Up to 132 tons (120 metric tons)
WEIGHT
HABITAT
Open ocean
Tropical, temperate, subpolar waters worldwide, except in regions with permanent sea ice
DISTRIBUTION
The blue whale, one of the rorqual whales, is probably the largest animal that has ever lived. Its heart is the size of a small car and its call, at about
ORDER CETACEA
Sperm Whale Physeter macrocephalus LENGTH
Up to 65 ft (20 m)
Up to 55 tons (50 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Deep water, especially close to edges of continental shelves
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Worldwide, except extreme north
OCEAN LIFE
and south
The largest toothed whale, the sperm whale is also the largest predator that hunts individual prey. Even in poor light, it is unmistakable, with a huge, square-ended head. Adult males are typically 13 ft (4 m) longer than females and twice as heavy. This species has wrinkled skin and a row of knobby projections between its dorsal fin and its tail. It dives to over 9,800 ft (3,000 m) to hunt giant squid. Its head contains a store of a waxy oil called spermaceti, which is thought to act as a buoyancy regulator.The oil may also help to focus beams of high-pitched sound, which the whale uses to detect its prey.
180 decibels, is louder than the sound of a jet aircraft taking off. This animal’s future hangs in the balance after decades of whaling. Although it is no longer hunted, it remains seriously endangered. The blue whale has a flattened head, a pointed snout, and a pleated, expandable throat. The rest of the body tapers to a pair of enormous tail fins (flukes). Blue whales are a mottled blue mixed with gray on their backs, but their undersides vary from white to yellow. They feed by filtering small animals, mostly krill and other small crustaceans, from the water. Their baleen plates can collect over 6,600 lb (3,000 kg) of food a day. Females give birth to a single calf every 2–3 years.
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Baleen strips are made of keratin, like human fingernails. The inner face of each strip is divided into hundreds of parallel fibres.
smooth outer face
fringed inner face
417 ORDER CETACEA
Cuvier’s Beaked Whale Ziphius cavirostris LENGTH 18–23 ft (5.5–7 m)
Up to 3.3 tons (3 metric tons)
WEIGHT
HABITAT
Deep water
DISTRIBUTION Tropical, subtropical, and temperate waters worldwide, except in far north and south
There are at least 20 species of beaked whales, but little is known about most of them. Cuvier’s beaked whale is probably one of the most widespread, because stranded specimens have been found in many parts of the world.
Like its relatives, it has an almost cylindrical body, a small dorsal fin placed far back, and relatively short flippers for its size. Its jaws are short and beaklike, with an upturned mouthline. Females are toothless, but in males, the lower jaw has two peglike teeth at its tip, which project when the mouth is closed. The overall color varies from gray and dark brown to yellow, with a swirling pattern of darker markings. Cuvier’s beaked whale lives in deep water and can dive for more than half an hour. Its feeding behavior is poorly known, apart from the fact that it preys on squid and fish. It has never been hunted commercially, but it is occasionally an accidental bycatch in fishing nets, an occurrence that has become more common with the spread of deep-water trawling.
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ORDER CETACEA
Northern Bottlenose Whale Hyperoodon ampullatus LENGTH 28–33 ft (8.5–10 m)
Up to 8.3 tons (7.5 metric tons)
WEIGHT
HABITAT
Deep water
DISTRIBUTION Arctic Ocean, temperate and subpolar waters of the north Atlantic
One of the largest beaked whales, this species has a gray body and a bulbous forehead, which sometimes overhangs its jaws. Males have two to four teeth, at the tip of the lower jaw; females rarely have any. Its tail fins (flukes) are large and powerful, but the front flippers are unusually small and set far forward, just behind the head. These whales are exceptionally good divers, capable of staying underwater for over two hours. Unlike other beaked whales, this species was commercially hunted for many years, but it is still locally abundant.
$URINGTHEBREEDINGSEASON BELUGASGATHERINHERDSTHATMAY BETHOUSANDSSTRONG7ITHINEACH HERD THEWHALESAREGROUPED ACCORDINGTOAGEANDSEX WITH PREGNANTANDNURSINGMOTHERS STAYINGCLOSETOGETHERWITHTHEIR YOUNG"ELUGASCOMMUNICATE USINGSOUND BUTTHEYCANALSO MAKEFACIALEXPRESSIONS©A UNIQUEATTRIBUTEAMONGWHALES 4HEYALSOOFTENHUNTINGROUPS ORDER CETACEA
Beluga Whale Delphinapterus leucas LENGTH
13–161/2 ft
(4– 5 m) ORDER CETACEA
Narwhal Monodon monoceros LENGTH
13–161/2 ft
(4–5 m) Up to 1.7 tons (1.5 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Polar waters, open leads in sea ice
HABITAT
The male narwhal is instantly recognizable by its unicorn-like tusk, which is up to 10 ft (3 m) long. A highly modified upper tooth,
Up to 1.7 tons (1.5 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Coastal waters, sometimes rivers
HABITAT
Arctic Ocean, Bering Sea, Sea of Okhotsk, Hudson Bay, Gulf of St. Lawrence
DISTRIBUTION
With its distinctive, yellowish white coloration, the beluga or white whale is easy to identify. In overall shape it is similar to its close relative the narwhal (see left), although it has no tusk. Its color changes with age: newborn belugas are dark gray, and it can take them up to ten years to assume the adult color, which comes with sexual maturity. Belugas are slow swimmers and feed on a wide variety of fish and other animals. They often live close inshore during summer months and may enter the lower reaches of large
rivers. They are remarkably sociable and vocal, making a range of different sounds, including trills, clicks, and chirps. In the days of wooden sailingships, these sounds were easily audible through hulls—earning belugas the nickname “canary of the seas.” Formerly abundant throughout the Arctic, belugas have been reduced to localized populations by centuries of hunting. They are still hunted today, although on a reduced scale, but they face growing threats from pollution and shipping traffic.
OCEAN LIFE
DISTRIBUTION Arctic Ocean, north as far as Svalbard and Franz Josef Land
the tusk emerges through the animal’s upper lip, developing spiral grooves as it grows. Apart from this outstanding feature, males and females are similar, with a long cylindrical body, a bulbous head, and very short, beaklike jaws. They are dappled gray above and pale or white beneath. The function of the narwhal’s tusk is unclear. It may be used for ritual combat during the breeding season, or even as a navigational aid, as it is packed with nerves.
418
animal life ORDER CETACEA
ORDER CETACEA
Indo-Pacific Humpback Dolphin
Bottlenose Dolphin Tursiops truncatus
Sousa chinensis
LENGTH
61/2 –10 ft
(2–3 m) 61/2 –91/4 ft (2–2.8 m) LENGTH
WEIGHT
WEIGHT
Coastal waters, open oceans
HABITAT
(200 kg) Coastal waters, lagoons, estuaries
HABITAT
Red Sea, Persian Gulf, Indian Ocean, and southwestern Pacific
Up to 1,450 lb
(650 kg)
Up to 440 lb DISTRIBUTION
Temperate and tropical regions
worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
This warm-water dolphin gets its name from the conspicuous hump beneath its dorsal fin. Generally seen alone or in pairs, it shows a wide variation in color—some specimens are bluish gray, while others are almost white, particularly when they age. It feeds on fish, octopus, and squid, and it rarely strays far from the shore. A similar species exists off the Atlantic coast of Africa, and both species roll their bodies when they breathe, instead of jumping clear of the water.
ORDER CETACEA
A familiar sight worldwide in marine aquariums, the bottlenose dolphin is a playful and inquisitive mammal, with a habit of interacting with humans in the wild. Its color varies from light blue to slate gray, with a paler underside. It has a pronounced beak, a slightly hooked dorsal fin, and up to 25 pairs of peglike teeth in each jaw. These dolphins are highly sociable and often travel in groups of several dozen. Like other dolphins, they find prey by echolocation, but they also use sound to communicate, using a complex repertoire of whistles, clicks, and squeaks. They frequently ride the bow-waves of ships and body-surf on breaking waves. Females give birth to a single calf once every 2–3 years. In some parts of the world, bottlenose dolphins play with human swimmers— a form of learned behavior that can persist for many years.
ORDER CETACEA
Long-snouted Spinner Dolphin
Common Dolphin Delphinus delphis
Stenella longirostris
51/2 –8 ft (1.7–2.4 m)
LENGTH LENGTH
41/4 –7
ft
WEIGHT
(1.3–2.1 m) WEIGHT
Up to 165 lb
Coastal waters, open oceans
HABITAT
(75 kg) HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
Open oceans
Temperate, subtropical, and tropical waters worldwide
DISTRIBUTION
Tropical and subtropical waters
worldwide
OCEAN LIFE
Up to 240 lb
(110 kg)
Graceful, energetic, and highly acrobatic, this dolphin gets its name from its habit of leaping out of the water and then spinning around up to seven times before splashing back into the sea. Smaller than many other oceanic dolphins, it is dark gray with white on its underside—the white varies from a small patch to a wide zone extending from its head almost to its tail. It has up to 64 pairs of teeth in each jaw, and it feeds on fish, often far out to sea. Females give birth to a single calf, suckling it for up to two years. Spinner dolphins are sociable, swimming in groups that range in size from less than 50 to several thousand and often traveling with other species. These dolphins and their close relatives often swim in large groups above shoals of yellowfin tuna, and thousands are drowned every year in purse-seine nets, which are intended to catch tuna but trap other marine life indiscriminately.
The common dolphin is beautifully marked with a complex pattern of colored bands and has inspired artists since classical times. Its markings are
extremely variable—so much so that experts differ on whether it is a single species or several. Often seen in large groups, this dolphin is highly active and acrobatic, and is among the fastest swimmers of all cetaceans, with a top speed of about 25 mph (40 km/h). Common dolphins usually feed far out to sea, where they prey on squid and small fish. Adult females give birth every 2–3 years, producing up to five calves during their lives. This dolphin is one of the most common cetaceans and has a global population estimated at several million. However, like other oceanic dolphins, it is threatened by both the expansion of fishing and deliberate hunting.
ORDER CETACEA
Risso’s Dolphin Grampus griseus LENGTH 10–14 ft (3–4.3 m) WEIGHT
Up to 1,100 lb
(500 kg) HABITAT DISTRIBUTION
Deep water
Tropical and warm-temperate waters
worldwide
Also known as the gray grampus, this large dolphin is typically blackish blue with a square head that is quite different from the pointed heads of beaked dolphins. Close up, this dolphin’s skin often appears scarred, especially in older individuals. Scarring is mainly due to fights between rivals, but some of it is due to encounters with squid, which make up a large proportion of its prey. When feeding, it can dive for up to half an hour. Risso’s dolphin is less sociable than many other dolphins, but it often swims alongside ships.
mammals ORDER CETACEA
Killer Whale Orcinus orca LENGTH 18–30 ft (5.5–9 m)
Up to 10 tons (9 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Open waters, areas of broken sea ice
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
worldwide
Tropical, temperate, and polar waters
With its conspicuous black-and-white markings, the killer whale, or orca, is—despite its name—the largest and most striking member of the dolphin family (Delphinidae). Apart from its bold patterning, its most eye-catching feature is its huge dorsal fin, which is up to 6 ft (1.8 m) high in older males. It has large, paddle-shaped flippers and a massive, barrel-shaped body that tapers toward streamlined jaws, which are armed with interlocking teeth up to 2 in (5 cm) long. Killer whales are the largest hunters of warm-blooded prey.
Their diet includes fish, squid, birds, seals, and other whales. Their hunting strategy is remarkably varied: they deliberately upend ice floes to tip seals into the sea, and they even lunge onto beaches to catch seals lying near the waterline. Intelligent, vocal, and highly sociable, they live in stable groups (pods), which develop their own cultural characteristics. Despite their ferocity toward prey animals, killer whales are easily tamed in captivity and have never been known to attack humans in the wild.
419
0/$3!.$#,!.3 !NAVERAGEKILLERWHALEPOD CONTAINSANIMALS WHICHSTAY TOGETHERFORLIFE OFTENSHARING CAREOFTHEYOUNG0ODSWITHIN THESAMEGEOGRAPHICALRANGE MAKEUPACLAN©AREGIONAL GROUPTHATISTHOUGHTTOHAVEA DISTINCTIVEªDIALECT«THATISPASSED ONFROMADULTSTOTHEIRYOUNG
OCEAN LIFE
ON THE MOVE
Female humpback whales typically breed every 2–3 years. The mother is very protective of her calf, which she suckles for 10–11 months.
422
animal life ORDER CETACEA
Long-finned Pilot Whale Globicephala melas 111/2 –23 ft (3.5–7 m)
LENGTH
Up to 3.8 tons (3.5 metric tons)
WEIGHT
Cold coastal waters, open oceans
HABITAT
Temperate and subpolar waters worldwide, except north Pacific
DISTRIBUTION
There are two species of pilot whales, distinguished primarily by the length of their flippers—a feature that is difficult to observe at sea. The longfinned pilot whale lives mainly in cold-water regions. It has glossy, jet black coloration, with an anchorshaped pale patch on the throat and chest. This species has a bulbous head and short jaws. Its long dorsal fin has a hooked shape in males. Its flippers have a sharp backward bend, or “elbow,” and are up to a fifth of its body length. Long-finned pilot whales feed mainly on deep-water
squid and octopus. They are highly gregarious, living in groups that can be hundreds strong, and often associate with other cetaceans. They easily become disoriented in shallow coastal waters, often becoming stranded in large numbers. This tendency to herd together has been exploited for centuries by whale hunters, who were able to drive them into shallow water for slaughter. In some locations—such as the Faroe Islands—pilot whales are still hunted today.
ORDER SIRENIA
West African Manatee Trichechus senegalensis LENGTH
10–13 ft (3–4 m)
WEIGHT
Up to 1,100 lb
(500 kg) Mangrove swamps, lagoons, inland waterways, estuaries
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION
ORDER CETACEA
Harbor Porpoise Phocoena phocoena 41/2 –61/2 ft (1.4–2 m)
LENGTH
WEIGHT
Up to 145 lb
OCEAN LIFE
(65 kg) Coastal waters, tidal regions of rivers
HABITAT
Cold-temperate and subpolar waters in Northern Hemisphere
DISTRIBUTION
One of the most common cetaceans in the Northern Hemisphere, the harbor porpoise, as its name suggests, rarely strays into deep water. It prefers shallow, coastal waters and sometimes
swims into rivers. It has a short, barrellike body, with small flippers and a blunt dorsal fin. Its overall color is dark gray, while its underside is paler. Unlike most dolphins, this porpoise has a blunt snout, which houses 21–28 pairs of spade-shaped teeth in each jaw. Harbor porpoises often live alone, or sometimes in pairs or small groups; they feed on fish and shellfish. Females give birth after a gestation period of up to 11 months, and the single calf is tiny by cetacean standards, weighing as little as 13 lb (6 kg). In the past, harbor porpoises were often hunted for meat and as a source of oil. Today, a greater threat is posed by fishing nets—being small, it is easy for them to become accidentally trapped.
West Africa, from Senegal to Angola
One of three species of manatees, this docile vegetarian lives mainly in fresh water but also feeds in the mangrove swamps on Africa’s west coast. It has a barrel-shaped body covered in coarse gray skin and front flippers with tiny nails. Like all sirenians, it has no hind limbs and swims with its spoon-shaped tail, which slowly beats up and down as it cruises through the shallows. Using its fleshy lips, it feeds on plants above and below the water line. Manatees lack the complex stomachs of terrestrial plant-eaters such as cattle and antelopes. Most digestion occurs in their intestines, which may be 150 ft (45 m) long. West African manatees live in groups of up to six and give birth to young about 3 ft (1 m) long. Their slow reproductive rate makes them vulnerable to environmental change, and to hunters who target them for meat and skin.
342!.$).' 0ILOTWHALESOFTENBECOME STRANDEDONBEACHES)FONE WHALESTRANDS OTHERSFREQUENTLY FOLLOW LEADINGTOAMASSSTRANDING 4HEORIESTOEXPLAINSTRANDING INVOLVEFACTORSTHATDISRUPTTHE WHALESNAVIGATIONALSYSTEMS SUCHASTEMPORARYANOMALIESIN %ARTHSMAGNETICFIELD SHIPS SONAR SICKNESS ANDSTORMS
423 ORDER SIRENIA
West Indian Manatee Trichechus manatus LENGTH 12–15 ft (3.7–4.6 m)
Up to 3,500 lb (1,600 kg)
WEIGHT
Coastal waters, inland waterways
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Western Atlantic from southeast US to northeast South America, Caribbean Sea
This is the largest species of manatee, and also the best studied—something explained partly by its distribution, which extends northward as far as Florida. Unlike the West African manatee, it often ventures into coastal waters, although it avoids regions where the winter temperature drops below 68˚F (20˚C). Its skin is gray, but
its upper surface is often colonized by algae, which gives it a greenish tinge. Its vision and hearing, provided by small eyes and ears, are not very acute, but its mobile lips are covered with sensitive bristles, which it uses to find underwater plants in depths of up to about 13 ft (4 m). It needs to consume approximately one-quarter of its body weight in food each day. Although its diet is mainly vegetarian, it sometimes eats fish to obtain protein. Manatees and dugongs (see below) owe their blimplike shapes partly to the large amounts of gas generated as they digest their food. To compensate for this, they have unusually dense bones, which help them to maintain neutral buoyancy. West Indian manatees usually live in groups of up to 20 animals, and when food is plentiful, groups may increase to over a hundred individuals.
HUMAN IMPACT
#/,,)3)/.2)3+ )NTHEPAST 7EST)NDIANMANATEES WEREHUNTEDFORTHEIRMEAT SKIN ANDOIL WHICHWASSOMETIMESUSED INLAMPS4ODAY THEMAINTHREATS FACINGTHEMAREPOLLUTIONAND COLLISIONSWITHBOATS)N&LORIDA WHEREBOATTRAFFICISHEAVY MANY MANATEESBEARTHESCARSOFTHEIR ENCOUNTERSWITHBOATS PROPELLER INJURY
These parallel scars on a manatee’s back were caused by a propeller. Fortunately, the cuts were not deep enough to be fatal.
ORDER SIRENIA
34%,,%23 3%!#/7
Dugong Dugong dugon LENGTH
8–13 ft (2.5–4 m)
550–1,900 lb (250–900 kg)
WEIGHT
Coastal shallows, lagoons, estuaries
HABITAT
DISTRIBUTION Indian Ocean and western Pacific, from East Africa to South Pacific islands
ARTIST’S IMPRESSION
Steller’s sea cow weighed up to 11 tons (10 metric tons) and was probably the largest marine mammal of its time, after whales.
OCEAN LIFE
Unlike manatees, the dugong is essentially a marine animal, grazing in seagrass beds in warm, shallow waters. Its body is blimp-shaped, like that of manatees, but it has a crescent-shaped tail and a broad head with a large, U-shaped upper lip. Part of its diet consists of buried stems or rhizomes, which it collects by nuzzling its way into the sediment, while steadying itself with its front flippers. Dugongs feed in scattered herds, which may contain more than a hundred animals. Their main predators are sharks, but they are more threatened by hunting in many places. The species is already extinct in the Mediterranean, where it may have existed until classical times, and it is under threat in many parts of the Indian Ocean. However, it appears to be thriving around the coastline of Australia, which is home to over half the world’s dugongs.
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ATLAS OF THE OCEANS
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OCEAN CIRCULATION
The floor of the Arctic Ocean consists of two main basins separated by the sharp Lomonsov Ridge. On the North American side lie the Canada and the Makarov basins, separated by the Alpha Cordillera. On the Eurasian side the Fram and Nansen basins are split by the Gakkel Ridge—an extension of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. The young Arctic Basin started to open about 36 million years ago, completing the separation of North America from Europe, and connecting the Arctic to the Atlantic. There is an unusually broad continental shelf on the Asian side of the ocean, with shallow seas extending more than 1,000 miles (1,600 km) from the coast in places, compared with the more typical 30–75 miles (50–125 km) on the North American side.
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Sea ice covering the Arctic expands from about 3 to 6 million square miles (7 to 15 million square km) from summer to winter.
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The Arctic receives a huge influx of fresh water from the great Siberian rivers—the Ob’,Yenisey, and Lena. Together with the freezing and melting of sea ice, this produces a layer of relatively fresh surface water. A clockwise gyre is established over the Canada Basin, while the Transpolar Current flows from the Chukchi Sea to the Greenland Sea. Warm, salty water enters the Arctic from the Atlantic at moderate depth, while very cold, very salty “bottom water” flows out into the Atlantic. Eighty percent of the Arctic’s water exchange is with the North Atlantic and 20 percent is with the Pacific. About two percent of the water leaving the Arctic is in the form of icebergs calved from the Greenland Ice Sheet. Arctic sea ice has reduced in area in recent decades and open water has even been found at the North Pole. The effect of global warming on the Arctic means that the ocean’s sea ice could disappear altogether by the end of the 21st century.
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THE SMALLEST OF THE OCEANS, the Arctic
+O TZE 3O BUE UN D
Ocean is nearly enclosed by Asia, Europe, Greenland, and North America. In winter it is almost entirely covered by pack ice, which halves in area during summer. Exploration of the Arctic in the 18th and 19th centuries was driven by the search for trade routes between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. The North Pole was first reached in 1909 by an American expedition using dogs and sleds, led by Robert Peary.
0
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THE ARCTIC OCEAN
SCALE
the arctic ocean
NORTHWEST PASSAGE
DISCOVERY
Much effort was expended in the 17th century in search of the Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to East Asia, but no viable route was found due to the yearround presence of sea ice and the numerous islands. Interest revived in the 19th century when expeditions were undertaken by the Royal Navy. In 1820 an expedition from Baffin Bay got as far as Melville Island before being blocked by ice. A group of 129 men was lost off King William Island in 1848. British explorer Robert McClure crossed from the Beaufort Sea to Baffin Bay in 1854, but he had to walk part of the way. It was the Norwegian Roald Amundsen who finally sailed a ship via Lancaster Sound, south of Victoria Island, and out through the Bering Strait in 1906.
Baffin Bay 266,000 square miles (689,000 square km) 6,900 ft (2,100 m)
Arctic Basin, Labrador Sea, glaciers of West Greenland
INFLOWS
GLACIER MEETING SEA
Current, often carrying icebergs into the North Atlantic. Seals have long been hunted in the area. Large numbers were killed each year as recently as the 1980s, but commercial hunting of marine mammals is now controlled.
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The deep Beaufort Sea lies to the west of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Oil was discovered off the Alaskan shore in 1968, and is also extracted off the MacKenzie delta. Artificial islands have been built to protect some production wells from drifting sea ice. Gas has also been found near Melville Island.
2O 3OUES7E ND LCOME
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Chukchi Sea, Arctic Basin, rivers Mackenzie, Colville INFLOWS
OIL EXPLORATION
0RINCE 2EG ENT) NLET
Baffin Bay lies between Greenland and Baffin Island, and is really the extreme northwest arm of the Atlantic. The surface ices over each winter, but warmer water from the Labrador Sea flows up its eastern shore, keeping parts of the adjacent Greenland coast ice-free. Water returns south along the western shore as the cold Labrador
184,000 square miles (476,000 square km)
AREA
MAXIMUM DEPTH
ARCTIC OCEAN E2
MAXIMUM DEPTH
Beaufort Sea
EXPLORING THE PASSAGE
are linked by the Northwest Passage through the Arctic Ocean. A difficult route to navigate, it includes many narrow straits between islands, and its surface is often frozen, even in summer. The region contains broad sedimentary basins, which may harbor rich mineral deposits, but exploration is hampered by the extremely cold climate.
THE ATLANTIC AND PACIFIC OCEANS
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THE BARENTS AND GREENLAND SEAS MARK
ARCTIC OCEAN E2
540,000 square miles (1.4 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
2,000 ft (600 m)
Norwegian Sea, Arctic Basin
The Barents Sea is relatively shallow, lying north of Europe and south of the islands of Svalbard and Franz Joseph Land. To the east, Novaya Zemlya is an extension of the Ural Mountains, which mark the geographical boundary between Europe and Asia. Large areas along the mainland and around the islands are continental shelf of less than 660 ft (200 m) deep. Warm water from the North Atlantic Drift flows in from the southwest, keeping most of the sea ice-free in summer. The Russian port of Murmansk
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remains free of ice even in the winter. The warm, salty Atlantic water meets cold, less saline Arctic water, and warm, moderately salty coastal water, producing an area of high biological productivity. The spring bloom of phytoplankton starts near the ice edge, where fresh water from melting ice produces a stable surface layer. The phytoplankton form the basis of a food chain that supports a rich fishery, and cod is the most important catch. During the Cold War, Russia maintained a large northern fleet of warships and submarines. Many of these vessels now lie deteriorating in naval ports along the Kola Peninsula, raising fears of possible damage to the marine environment. Particular concerns have been raised about contamination from the nuclear reactors of abandoned submarines.
Greenland Sea 463,000 square miles (1.2 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
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The Greenland Sea, which stretches between Greenland, Svarlbad, and Jan Mayen Island, is a major area of sea-ice formation in the Arctic Ocean. The East Greenland Current carries surface water and ice south along the coast of Greenland, but the Jan Mayen Current takes some surface water to the east. This divergence leaves an area of open water where new sea ice is
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continually formed in the winter. An ice tongue, known as the Odden, develops eastward from the main ice edge, and dissolved salt is left behind in a layer of cold, briny water beneath the new ice. Being more dense, this very salty water sinks to the seafloor, where it pools before spilling over the ridges between Greenland and Jan Mayen to the south. This downwelling plays a major role in the global thermohaline circulation (see pp.60-61) of the oceans. ICY PANCAKES
Pancake ice is formed in rough water as cakes of icy slush bump into each other, producing a raised rim.
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straddles the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and is one of the few places on Earth where it is possible to walk on newly created oceanic crust. It is the site of sea floor spreading that was responsible for linking the Atlantic to the Arctic Ocean around 36 million years ago. The surrounding seas are areas of water and heat exchange between the two oceans.
Denmark Strait 300 miles (480 km) 180 miles (290 km)
Most of the water leaving the Arctic Ocean flows into the north Atlantic through the Denmark Strait, propelled by the East Greenland Current. Icebergs from the eastern side of the Greenland Ice Sheet are carried south by this cold current, while the warm North Atlantic Drift flows northeast on the eastern side of the island, between Iceland and the Faeroe Islands. At depth, cold, dense Arctic bottom water pools to the northeast
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of Iceland until it overflows the Greenland–Iceland Rise and cascades 6,500 ft (2,000 m) down into the main Atlantic basin. This is the start of a global journey as the dense water circulates around the deepest parts of the world’s oceans—the deep-water leg of the “great ocean conveyor belt” (see p.61). In winter, sea ice builds up along the Greenland coast. Sometimes, cold winds blow east off the Greenland Ice Sheet, pushing sea ice offshore. More sea ice is created as the wind cools the exposed surface water, and a tongue of sea ice can extend south from the Greenland Sea through the Denmark Strait.
930 miles (1,500 km)
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The Reykjanes Ridge is the part of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge that rises up to the ocean surface to the southwest of Iceland. The ridge clearly displays the parallel ridges and valleys that are left behind on either side of the central rift as the sea floor spreads at a divergent plate boundary. Here, the North American and Eurasian plates are moving apart at 1/2 –1 in (1–2 cm) per year. The parallel
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features become less distinct away from the ridge, as the older crust is draped in sediment in the Reykjanes Basin and Iceland Basin. Before this rifting started, Greenland and Britain were almost adjacent, connected by a land bridge. The Hebrides and Faeroe Islands, Rockall, and the other banks on the eastern side of the Iceland Basin are the result of basalt floods associated with the early stages of the rift. SURTSEY
Surtsey was born in 1963 when a volcano on the western flank of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge breached the surface of the sea off Iceland.
4
the western north atlantic
THE WESTERN NORTH ATLANTIC
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Grand Banks
35,000 square miles (90,700 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
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1,240 ft (377 m)
Gulf of St. Lawrence 60,000 square miles (155,000 square km)
AREA
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
7,550 ft (2,300 m)
Atlantic Ocean, St. Lawrence River
The gulf lies between the mouth of the St. Lawrence River and the islands of Newfoundland and Cape Breton. The Laurentian Trough, between the two islands, was scoured out by the Laurentide Ice Sheet during the last ice age. It channels sediment from the river over the edge of the continental shelf and onto the Laurentian Fan. The St. Lawrence River is the largest A
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The Grand Banks is a large area of continental shelf, extending up to 310 miles (500 km) off Newfoundland. The area is renowned for dense sea fogs, which arise when warm, moist air from the south is chilled by the cold Labrador Current, causing condensation. The Labrador Current presents another shipping hazard by bringing icebergs to the area—the Titanic famously sank south of the Grand Banks in 1912. Although turbidity currents have never been directly observed, their power was felt in 1929 when an earthquake triggered a huge sediment flow (submarine landslide) down the continental slope off the Grand Banks. Submarine telegraph and telephone cables were broken over a distance of 500 miles (800 km)—from the timing of the breaks, the speed of the flow was estimated at 25–34 mph (40–55 km/h).
during the last ice age. Georges Bank stands 330 ft (100 m) above the floor of the Gulf, and was an island until 6,000 years ago. Cape Cod and the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard are the highest standing of a series of moraines left behind as the glaciers retreated and the sea level rose. Occasionally, the Gulf Stream lies not far offshore and the temperature of the sea off Nantucket beaches can be several degrees higher than it is off nearby Cape Cod. North of the Gulf of Maine, the Bay of Fundy extends more than 120 miles (200 km) inland. The bay acts like a funnel, producing a tidal range of 43 ft (13 m) at its northern end, which is the highest in the world.
freshwater input to the Atlantic from the North American east coast, and its mouth is the largest estuary of its type in the world. The St. Lawrence Seaway, which was opened in 1959, gives vital shipping access to the Great Lakes.
108,000 square miles (280,000 square km)
AVERAGE DEPTH
warm, fast-flowing INFLOWS Atlantic Ocean; St. John, Penobscott rivers Gulf Stream pulls away from the North American coast and runs Like much of the continental shelf off northeastward as the North Atlantic Drift. The Labrador Current the east coast of North America, the brings cold water south along the coast as far as the Gulf of Maine. Gulf of Maine was above sea level ATLANTIC OCEAN C2
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northwest coast of Europe, the largest of which is the North Sea. The North Atlantic Drift brings warmer water into the region, producing the mild climate enjoyed by adjacent coastal areas.
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The Baltic is a shallow, virtually enclosed inland sea with little tide. It does not benefit from the warmth of the North Atlantic Drift, and its northern branches, the Gulf of Bothnia and the Gulf of Finland, ice over in the
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INFLOWS
Water from the Atlantic enters the North Sea between the Shetland and Orkney Islands, flowing south down the Scottish and English coasts. Warmer Atlantic water also enters from the English Channel and flows east along the Dutch coast, resulting in a counterclockwise circulation. The largest sand banks on the North Sea floor, including the Dogger, Jutland,
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and Fisher banks, are terminal moraines marking the southern edge of the ice sheet during the last ice age, when the bottom of the sea was exposed by lower sea levels. A trough located to the west of the Norwegian Trench is buried under thick sediments that contain oil and gas deposits.
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winter. A large influx of river water gives the Baltic a low salinity—it is the largest area of brackish water in the world. Its only outflow is to the North Sea via the Danish Straits (three channels linking the Baltic to the Kattegat), Kattegat Bay, and the Skagerrak Strait. There is a weak influx of dense salt water at depth that isolates the basin floor from the surface waters, producing an oxygen-depleted dead zone. Without significant outflows, the Baltic Sea is vulnerable to pollution carried in by rivers and from large population centers on its coasts. Although there is a sea route to the North Sea, there is also a shorter, more sheltered route through the Kiel Canal.
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The Norwegian Sea lies between Norway and Iceland, separated from the main part of the north Atlantic by the submarine Faeroe–Iceland Ridge. Although situated at high latitude, this sea is kept free of ice by the warm, salty North Atlantic Drift, which flows from the southwest between Scotland and Iceland and continues into the Barents
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MIDDELGRUNDEN WIND FARM
Arranged in an elegant curve 1.2 miles (2 km) east of Copenhagen, Denmark, each of this wind farm’s 20 turbines can produce 2 megawatts of electricity.
wind-farming in the baltic OFFSHORE WIND FARMS
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Declining oil stocks, threats to fuel supplies, and the risks of climate change are increasingly focusing attention on alternative sources of energy that do not generate greenhouse gases. After hydroelectricity, wind-farming is the most advanced source of renewable energy. It is easiest to build wind farms on land, but many people do not want turbines built near their homes. Wind farms built at sea are less controversial, although costlier to build and maintain. However, it is usually windier at sea and there are no hills or trees to cause turbulence, so offshore turbines are more efficient than land-based ones. The world’s first commercial wind farm was built in the Baltic (see below). Other large wind farms are in place in British and Irish waters, and Japan also wants to develop such schemes. Canada has a proposal for a large wind farm off the coast of British Columbia, and there are plans for major wind farms off Cape Cod and Long Island in the US, although these are proving controversial and some members of Congress are attempting to stall them. Because they burn no fossil fuels, wind farms can help reduce greenhouse gases. However, the overall benefits may take some time to appear. It can take 1,000 tons of concrete just to build the foundations of an offshore turbine, and concrete production is one of the biggest sources of greenhouse gases.
439
MASSIVE BLADES Wind-turbine blades are assembled on the dockside, then carried to the tower on a barge. The rotors reach 295 ft (95 m) in diameter. FOUNDATIONS The concrete foundations of a turbine are cast onshore in a dry dock. They are then floated out to sea and sunk in shallow water on site.
The countries around the Baltic Sea have played a central role in the development of offshore wind energy. The world’s first commercial offshore wind farm was commissioned in 1991 near the Danish fishing port of Vindeby. It is easiest to build in shallow water, and the first of these wind farms were sited in water less than 33 ft (10 m) deep. The Baltic is ideal for windfarming, with an average depth of just 180 ft (55 m). wind farms under construction
wind farms
POWER DISTRIBUTION
BALTIC WIND FARMS
Sea
Middelgrunden
DENMARK Vindeby
Baltic Sea
POLAND GERMANY
CASUALTIES
SWEDEN
North
NORTH SEA WIND FARMS
N O R W AY
SUBSTATION The electricity generated by offshore turbines has to be transmitted to land. This substation collects power from 72 turbines at the Nysted Offshore Wind Farm off southern Denmark, and transforms it from 33,000 to 132,000 volts for transmission ashore via 30 miles (48 km) of submarine cable.
HORNS REV Sited in the North Sea off the coast of Jutland, Horns Rev is Denmark’s largest wind farm and is one of the largest wind farms in the world. It began producing electricity in 2002 and has 80 turbines, positioned between 9 and 13 miles (14 and 20 km) offshore. Horns Rev can produce enough power for about 150,000 Danish households.
WHITE-TAILED EAGLE Although wind energy may bring about potentially huge benefits for wildlife by reducing climate change, turbines do sometimes harm birds. Four dead white-tailed eagles were found at an offshore Norwegian wind farm in early 2006.
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The name of these islands derives not from the yellow bird of the same name, but from the Latin word for dogs, Canaria. The islands are volcanic, overlying a mantle hotspot. Pico del Teide on Tenerife is the third largest volcano on Earth, rising more than 12,000 ft (3,700 m) above sea level, or almost 23,000 ft (7,000 m) from the sea floor. It
The islands rise from the extensive Azores Plateau, an area of thickened ocean crust. Although volcanic in origin, the oldest islands also include substantial accumulations of limestone and clay sediments. A mantle hotspot (see p.51) underlies the plateau and seems to be slowly spreading it apart at the Terceira Rift, a fracture that links the East Azores Fracture Zone to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. The last volcanic eruption in the Azores was in 1957, when the Capelinhos volcano produced a cinder island (an island composed of lava fractures called cinders) off Faial’s coast. last erupted in 1909. Teide’s slopes are unstable, and there is evidence that huge landslides have occurred in the past. There is also a risk that volcanic activity or earth tremors could cause part of La Palma island to slip into the sea, resulting in an enormous tsunami. Such an event would threaten the coasts of the north Atlantic, including heavily populated parts of North America, with inundation.
TENERIFE ISLAND
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
3,300 ft (1,000 m) 6,500 ft (2,000 m) 9,800 ft (3,000 m)
9
The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is the dominant seafloor feature in the eastern Atlantic region, with a central trough and numerous transform fracture zones. Just east of the ridge, the Azores island group straddles the triple junction between the Eurasian, African, and North American plates.
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
land
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890 square miles (2,300 square km)
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sea level
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The Bay of Biscay lies between Brest, on the Brittany Peninsula, and the north coast of Spain. The northern half of the bay is quite shallow, overlying the continental shelf, but this steeply drops away to the Biscay Plain, which is a small, partially opened ocean basin. Ships crossing the bay experience heavy seas, as
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15,535 ft (4,735 m)
Loire, Dordogne, Garonne, Adour rivers
full-size Atlantic rollers are amplified by the sudden shallow depth. There is a weak counterclockwise surface current within the bay. The Charcot Seamounts, Azores–Biscay Rise, and Kings Trough mark an inactive crustal fracture where the sea floor was once splitting apart.
LIGHTHOUSE ON THE BAY
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MAXIMUM DEPTH
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THE MEDITERRANEAN SEA AND BLACK SEA enclosed sea, with high evaporation and salinity, a very small tidal range, and a complex floor. The adjacent Black Sea is the last remnants of the Tethys Ocean, which closed as Africa converged with Eurasia.
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
THE MEDITERRANEAN IS AN ALMOST
ATLANTIC OCEAN D2
Western Mediterranean AREA
328,000 square miles (850,000 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
11,800 ft (3,600 m)
Atlantic Ocean; Ebro, Rhône rivers
The entire Mediterranean loses three times more water by evaporation than it gains from rainfall and rivers combined. This loss is balanced by a surface inflow from the Atlantic through the Strait of Gibraltar. The inflow continues as an eastward current along the north African coast, giving rise to a counterclockwise circulation
in the western Mediterranean. At depth there is a strong undercurrent of outflowing salty water. The flat floors of the Algerian and Balearic basins are underlain by deep sediments. In contrast, the Tyrrhenian Sea contains many seamounts and ridges. A chain of active volcanoes (including Etna, Stromboli, and Vesuvius) is found on the sea’s eastern margin, where the African Plate is subducting beneath the Eurasian Plate. The eastward flow of surface water continues through the Strait of Sicily into the eastern Mediterranean. The narrower Strait of Messina, between Sicily and mainland Italy, is notorious for its whirlpool, possibly the inspiration for the Greek mythological sea monster Charybdis.
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Eastern Mediterranean AREA
637,000 square miles (1.65 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
16,720 ft (5,095 m)
Black Sea; Adige, Nile, Po rivers
The eastern and western parts of the Mediterranean are separated by Sicily and the submerged Malta and Tunisian plateaus. The eastward flow from the western Mediterranean continues along the African coast, and a counterclockwise circulation prevails in the eastern Mediterranean, and in the Ionian, Aegean, and Adriatic seas. Surface water becomes more saline through evaporation as it travels east,
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and starts to sink after cooling by winter winds. It then returns westward, exiting through the Strait of Gibraltar about 150 years after entering. The sea floor is dominated by the Mediterranean Ridge, a result of compression between the convergent African and Eurasian plates. These sediments are older—70 million years compared with 25 million years in the western Mediterranean. The Adriatic Sea is a shallow branch of the eastern Mediterranean. Rising sea levels at the end of the last ice age flooded valleys parallel to its eastern shore, giving rise to the islands of the Dalmatian coastline. VENICE LAGOON
Venice was built in the shallow waters of a lagoon in the Adriatic. Its merchants grew rich by controlling access to the Silk Route.
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the Aegean microplate. The Aegean Volcanic Arc stretches from Greece to Turkey through the southern Cyclades. These volcanoes are dormant or extinct, but earthquakes still occur at a depth of 95–105 miles (150–170 km). The islands of Santorini, in the southern Cyclades, are the remains of an explosive volcanic eruption around 1640 bc. This was the largest volcanic event of the last 10,000 years and may have caused the downfall of Crete’s Minoan civilization. Behind the volcanic arc, the main Cyclades sit on top of a subsided plateau. At the northern end of the Aegean, a transform fault marks the contact with the Eurasian Plate, an area prone to strong, shallow earthquakes.
The islands of Santorini in the Aegean Sea are the remains of an explosive volcanic eruption about 3,500 years ago.
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Black Sea AREA
163,000 square miles (422,000 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
7,200 ft (2,200 m)
Mediterranean Sea, Sea of Azov; Danube, Dniester, Dnieper, Kizil Irmak rivers INFLOWS
The Black Sea is an enclosed inland sea, connected to the Mediterranean Sea via the Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmara, and the Bosporus. There is negligible exchange of water with the Mediterranean, and the surface waters of the Black Sea are about half as saline as the eastern Mediterranean. A previous small outflow through the Bosporus to the Aegean appears to have been reversed due to reduced inflow after the damming of some of the rivers feeding the Black Sea. Although the surface waters are relatively fresh, below about 330– 490 ft (100–150 m) lies a highly saline water body with very slow turnover. Decaying organic matter consumes all the oxygen in this water, making the Black Sea the world’s largest oxygenfree marine system—the deep water is essentially dead. The basin is an isolated
BLACK SEA SHIPPING
The Bosporus, the narrowest strait open to international navigation, connects the Black Sea with the Sea of Marmara.
remnant of the north shore of the ancient Tethys Ocean. The southern part of the Black Sea is deep, but it is not as deep as the Mediterranean, and the underlying crust is thicker than most ocean crust. The northern parts—the Sea of Azov and the Gulf of Odessa—overlie a shallow continental shelf. The delta of the Danube, Europe’s longest river, extends from the western shore, and Danube waters have carried sediment across the edge of the shelf to build up a thick cone of sediment.
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
The Aegean Sea contains more than 1,000 islands and is the source of most of the Mediterranean’s cold, saline deep water. Before 1990 this source was in the Adriatic, but climate changes have led to increased winter cooling in the Aegean. It is a geologically complex area, as the Aegean microplate and the Anatolian Plate to the east are caught between the converging African and Eurasian plates. The Aegean crust is of continental thickness, but has been stretched and thinned, notably in the area of the Cretan Trough, so that much of it is now below sea level. The Hellenic Trough and Pliny Trench mark where the African Plate is subducting beneath
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The Sargasso Sea is a large area of the north Atlantic southeast of Bermuda. It is bounded by ocean currents: the Gulf Stream to its west and north, the Canary Current far to the east, and the North Equatorial Current to its south. The area between these currents rotates slowly in a clockwise direction and is often quite calm. Large mats of yellow-brown sargassum seaweed float on its surface, providing shelter and food for communities of small crustaceans and fish, including freshwater eels. Adult eels migrate to the Sargasso every year to mate and spawn, and their young are carried back to the rivers of North America and Europe by the Gulf Stream. Deep water in this part of the Atlantic flows from north to south.
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Opened in 1914, the Panama Canal links the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific, allowing ships to avoid the long journey around Cape Horn. Its construction was one of the most difficult engineering projects ever attempted, taking ten years and costing many lives. Each year, 14,000 ships use the canal.
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The Caribbean Sea is a tropical body of water bounded to its south and west by South and Central America, and to its north and east by the Greater and Lesser Antilles. Most of the Antilles, and some parts of the mainland coast, are fringed with coral reefs and small, low-lying islets called cays (or keys). The underlying Caribbean Plate was once part of the Pacific Ocean floor, and it is still moving slowly eastward between the North and South American plates. A subduction zone separates the Caribbean Plate
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from the Atlantic Plate to the east, giving rise to the volcanic island arc of the Lesser Antilles. An east-to-west surface current permeates the whole of the Caribbean, with water from the Guiana Current flowing in via gaps between the small islands in the east, and flowing out in to the Gulf of Mexico via the Yucatán Channel in the northwest.
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Circulation is weak, and the water becomes more salty as it is heated up. Inflows from rivers and the Caribbean are balanced by an outflow of warm, salty water—the beginnings of the Gulf Stream—via the Straits of Florida to the east. This channel runs between two limestone plateaus—the Florida peninsula, above sea level to the north, and the Bahamas, a submerged plateau topped by low-lying islands to the south. The coasts of the Gulf are affected by powerful hurricanes in the late summer and fall.
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mountain chain, is the main sea-floor feature in the central Atlantic. On either side of the ridge are two flat abyssal plains, the Angola and Brazil basins. The dominant Atlantic gyres meet in the central Atlantic. Both are westward-flowing near the equator, but are separated by the Equatorial Countercurrent, a strong eastward surface flow, and the Equatorial Undercurrent, an even stronger flow 330 ft (100 m) deep. The Canaries Current flows south along the North African coast, becoming the North Equatorial Current. In the south, the cold Benguela Current flows up the African coast, then away from the coast as the South Equatorial Current. This current splits where it reaches South America, becoming the Guiana and rather weak Brazil currents.
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Atlantic Ocean; Niger, Volta rivers
Part of the north Atlantic’s Canaries Current continues along the African coast and into the Gulf of Guinea as the eastward-flowing Guinea Current. The main freshwater input to the gulf is provided by the Niger River, which has an extensive depositional fan, up to 2.5 miles (4 km) thick. An even greater source of fresh water for the south Atlantic is from the Congo River to the south. Large oil and gas reserves have accumulated in the sediments of the Niger Delta and Fan, and Nigeria is Africa’s biggest oil producer. Smaller deposits lie in the Congo Fan and in the continental shelf off Gabon, and deeper water in the Gulf of Guinea is now being explored for oil. When the Atlantic Ocean basin started to open 180 million years ago, three rifts opened up in the crust, forming a tectonic G
Although there are doubtless human skeletons on the Skeleton Coast, the ones most likely to be seen are those of rusting ships.
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The cold Benguela Current hugs the west coast of southern Africa and dominates its climate. Although prevailing winds are from the sea, the air above the cold water carries little moisture, and the adjacent coast is a desert. When warm air from the land meets the cold sea air, dense fogs often form. This can be a hazard to navigation, as testified to by the numerous ship hulks along the notorious Skeleton Coast. Even without the fog, any vessel disabled by engine trouble is driven toward the shore by wind and current, and the nearest ports are quite distant. Many sailors who have survived being shipwrecked here have had little choice
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This image, taken from a space shuttle, shows the delta coastline of the Niger River, and sediments being carried offshore.
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MAXIMUM DEPTH
but to attempt the arduous journey out of the Namib Desert on foot. Namibia’s coastal waters are dredged for diamonds, as the Benguela Current carries sediments from the Orange River north along the coast. These sediments include large quantities of gem-quality diamonds washed down from the South African interior. A rich fishery is another by-product of the Benguela Current, which causes upwelling of nutrient-rich waters.
ATLANTIC OCEAN K4
.I G ER
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triple-junction. Two of the rifts continued opening to the south and the west, forming today’s south Atlantic Ocean. Activity in the third rift, to the northeast, ceased rather quickly. The site of this stalled spreading center is marked by a chain of extinct volcanoes, including the islands of Annabon, São Tomé, Principe, and Bioco in the Gulf of Guinea, and Mount Cameroon inland. São Tomé rises 6,640 ft (2,020 m) above sea level.
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INFLOWS
18,300 ft (5,576 m)
Southern Ocean
The Scotia Sea is bounded by Tierra del Fuego and South Georgia to the north, the South Shetland and South Orkney islands to the south, and the South Sandwich Islands to the east. It is swept by the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, which flows from the Pacific into the Atlantic through the Drake Passage. Part of this flow turns north along the eastern shore of South America as the cold Falklands Current. Where it meets the warm waters of the Brazil Current north of the Falkland Islands,
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waters that adjoin it lie between the south Atlantic and the Southern Ocean. Sea ice is present around the region’s shorelines in winter, and icebergs calved from the Antarctic ice sheets can be found year-round.
350,000 square miles (900,000 square km)
upwelling of nutrients supports a rich fishery. The Scotia Plate is moving eastward relative to the South American and Antarctic plates. The separation of South America and Antarctica began around 100 million years ago, opening up a route for Pacific Ocean currents to flow into the young south Atlantic and Indian Ocean basins—the first step in the thermal isolation of Antarctica.
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Strait of Magellan LENGTH
330 miles (530 km)
MINIMUM WIDTH
2½ miles (4 km)
The first European known to have sailed from the Atlantic into the Pacific was Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan, and the strait he used between the South American mainland and Tierra del Fuego is named after him. The route is sheltered from the full might of the Southern Ocean, although it has some narrow passages that can be hazardous to navigate. It was the preferred route for Atlantic– Pacific sea trade until the confirmation of an open ocean route around Cape Horn in 1616. Another sheltered route through the Tierra del Fuego archipelago is the Beagle Channel, named after the survey ship that carried British naturalist Charles Darwin on his scientific voyage of 1831–1836. Cape Horn is the southernmost point of South America, situated on Hoorn Island, one of the Hermite Islands to the south of Tierra del Fuego. The most
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CAPE HORN
Cape Horn is notorious for its atrocious weather conditions. Sailing around it is the peak of many sailors’ ambitions.
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RATE OF CLOSURE
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27,300 ft (8,325 m) 2¾ in (7 cm) per year
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Sea ice clings to the shore of Bellinghausen Island, of the South Shetland group, named after the Russian explorer who discovered it in the 19th century.
Mount Belinda, on Montague Island, entered an eruptive phase in 2001, and was still active when this satellite image was taken in 2005.
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ATLANTIC OCEAN F3
South Georgia Ridge LENGTH
1,600 miles (2,500 km)
HEIGHT ABOVE SEA FLOOR RATE OF RELATIVE MOTION
4
8
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South Sandwich Trench lies a little farther to the east. Both features are caused by tectonic processes occurring where the Scotia and South Atlantic plates meet. The Scotia Plate is split and spreading at the East Scotia Ridge, forming a new plate at its eastern end— the South Sandwich microplate. This plate is geologically young, at about eight million years old, and buoyant. Moving eastward at about 2¾ in (7 cm) per year, it is converging with the South Atlantic Plate, resulting in the older South Atlantic Plate sinking beneath the South Sandwich Plate at a subduction zone. This zone is marked by the South Sandwich Trench and the volcanic island arc of the South Sandwich Islands (or the Scotia Arc).
SOUTH SANDWICH VOLCANO
9,800 ft (3,000 m) ¼ in (0.7 cm) per year
The South Georgia Ridge marks the northern edge of the Scotia Plate, a boundary that continues east through the Tierra del Fuego archipelago. This is a transform boundary (see p.50) with the South Atlantic Plate to the north. There is a similar transform boundary marked by the South Scotia Ridge, with the Antarctic Plate to the south. Fragments of continental crust, such as Burdwood Bank and South Georgia, seem to have been left behind as South America moved west. The island of South Georgia was named by James Cook in 1775, but may have been sighted as early as 1675. It was a base for seal hunters in the 19th century, and
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in the 20th century seven whaling stations were established on the more sheltered northern shore. The last of these closed in 1965. North of the South Georgia Ridge lies the Falkland Plateau, an area of thickened ocean crust of moderate depth, and the broad continental shelf off the east coast of South America—the Patagonian Shelf. The Falkland Islands are a continental fragment left over from the breakup of Gondwana (see p.46) and the subsequent opening of the south Atlantic. ABANDONED WHALING STATION
Old, rusting whaling ships lie in the harbor at Grytviken, a whaling station from 1904–65, on South Georgia.
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
Although discovered by James Cook in 1775, the South Sandwich Islands were not visited until 1818, when seal hunters landed. They were never permanently settled and remain uninhabited. With volcanic peaks rising up to 3,300 ft (1,000 m) above sea level, the islands are mostly composed of basaltic lava and covered by glaciers. North of the islands is the Protector Shoal— an undersea volcano that rises to within 100 ft (30 m) of the surface. The South Sandwich Islands mark the eastern boundary of the Scotia Sea, and the
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Poles are used as perches by some fishermen in Sri Lanka, so as not to scare away the fish.
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The Indian Ocean floor is dominated by three mid-ocean ridges— the Southwest Indian Ridge, the Mid-Indian Ridge, and the Southeast Indian Ridge—which meet at a triple junction.The Indian Ocean started opening when Africa separated from Antarctica and Australia, achieving its present form when India collided with Asia 36 million years ago. Two long, linear features record India’s rapid movement northward: Ninetyeast Ridge and the Chagos–Lacadive Plateau. The Indian Ocean has just one large oceanic trench—the Java–Sunda Trench, where the Australian and Indian plates are subducting beneath the Eurasian Plate. The Indian and Australian plates now appear to be moving independently, but the location of their boundary is uncertain.
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T H E I N D I A N O C EAN I S T H E T H I R D - L AR GEST ocean on Earth, lying between Africa and Australia. Sea routes across the northern Indian Ocean were opened up by traders from the Persian Gulf, and by the Chinese Admiral Zheng He between 1405 and 1433. The Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama was the first European to circumnavigate Africa, reaching India in 1498.
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1,600 ft (500 m)
The southern Indian Ocean is dominated by the counterclockwise South Indian Gyre. This drives the South Equatorial Current, which in turn feeds the Agulhas Current. The circulation north of the equator is complicated by the Indian subcontinent, and the annual wind reversal that characterizes the monsoon climate. High pressure over India from November to April pushes surface water in the Arabian Sea away from India, generating the North Equatorial Current and Equatorial Countercurrent. In the summer, low pressure over India gives rise to southwesterly winds, the Southwest Monsoon Current replaces the North Equatorial Current, and the Somali Current flows strongly northeast along the East African coast.
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Clear water off the Kenyan coast reveals rock shoals, coral growth, and sand bars.
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AREA
175,000 square miles (450,000 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
9,975 ft (3,040 m)
Arabian Sea
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MOVING OIL
Much of the ship traffic in the Persian Gulf and Red Sea today carries oil from the region’s production fields.
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The Persian Gulf (also known as the Gulf) is a warm, semi-enclosed sea, mostly less than 330 ft (100 m) deep. It is connected to the Arabian Sea via the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman. The shallow waters are well mixed and more productive than the Red Sea owing to the nutrient runoff from the land to the north and east. Corals have adapted to the very warm water temperature, which can reach 91°F (33°C). The Arabian Plate, spreading from the Red Sea rift, is moving northeast and sliding under the Eurasian Plate, so the northeastern side of the Persian Gulf is deeper. This tectonic activity has folded and uplifted sediments up to 280 million years old and produced structural traps for oil, which has accumulated in large reservoirs beneath the Gulf and surrounding land. Oil now dominates the region’s economy.
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Arabian Sea AREA
1.5 million square miles (3.9 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
19,038 ft (4,481 m)
Indus, Namada rivers
The Arabian Sea lies between the Arabian Peninsula and India. It is underlain by the abyssal plain of the Arabian Basin. This oceanic part of the Indian Plate is bounded to the west by the Owen Fracture zone, a transform
boundary with the Arabian Plate, and to the south by the Carlsberg Ridge, a mid-ocean spreading ridge where India and Africa are diverging. To the west lies the Gulf of Aden, a precursor to the Red Sea rift, with a well-established spreading ridge. The continental shelf of the Indian subcontinent to the east is broad in places, and the depositional fan of the Indus River extends some distance across the deep floor of the basin. Mumbai, formerly known as Bombay, is the largest port on the Indian coast.
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93,000 square miles (241,000 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
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The Red Sea is an embryonic ocean, and it has been opening over the last 25 million years, ever since the Arabian Plate began its gradual rift away from Africa. A central trough is flanked by relatively shallow shelves, and its warm waters contain many fringing coral reefs. Since 1869 the Red Sea has been linked with the Mediterranean Sea via the 100-mile(160-km-) long Suez Canal.
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C I R C U L AT I O N I N T H E N O R T H EAST Indian Ocean uniquely reverses twice a year due to the monsoon winds. For thousands of years, navigators used this to run trade routes in the region. Today, oil and the Suez Canal make the area strategically important. INDIAN OCEAN B4
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Maldives TYPE AREA:
Coral atoll islands 115 square miles (298 square km)
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
1,192
The Maldives lie midway along the Chagos–Laccadive Plateau. The Laccadive Islands and a number of submerged banks mark the northern end of the ridge. There are more than 1,000 Maldive islands, grouped into 27 atolls, composed of coral and sandbars. The highest island is less than 10 ft (3 m) above sea level. With
a warm climate, shallow lagoons, and refreshing sea breezes, the Maldives are an idyllic vacation destination. Although tourism plays an increasingly important role in the economy of the islands, fishing remains the main occupation of the islanders.
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APPROACHING DISASTER
Tourists run for their lives in the path of the first of six giant tsunami waves that hit Hat Rai Lay beach on the western coast of southern Thailand.
the 2004 indian ocean tsunami
WAVE SPEED AND HEIGHT A tsunami wave travels at the speed of a jet: 300–500 mph (500– 800 km/h), depending on the ocean depth, slowing to 90 mph (150 km/h) as it approaches the shore. The 2004 tsunami crossed the Indian Ocean to Somalia in just eight hours. A tsunami does not lose much energy as it crosses an ocean and can cause much damage on distant coasts. Waves over 13 ft (4 m) high, a similar size to those that struck Thailand, hit the coasts of the Seychelles and Somalia. Deaths were reported in South Africa, 5,300 miles (8,500 km) from the earthquake’s epicenter.
EFFECTS OF THE TSUNAMI
BEFORE AND AFTER
LOHKNGA These satellite pictures show the Indonesian village of Lohknga before the disaster, on January 10, 2003 (top image), and afterward, on December 29, 2004 (bottom). The village was flattened, as was the nearby town of Leupung, where only 1,800 survived out of a population of 10,000. All the sand on the beach and nearly all the vegetation around the village were stripped away, and 25 square miles (65 square km) of agricultural land was flooded behind the village. The wave is thought to have been 50 ft (15 m) high when it struck the shore, and it ran 21/2 miles (4 km) inland up to 80 ft (25 m) above sea level.
SUMATRA The devastation stretched 140 miles (225 km) along the Sumatran coast. Across Indonesia, 127,000 people were killed.
CONSEQUENCES
At 7:58 am on December 26, 2004, the Indonesian island of Sumatra was shaken by an earthquake that measured 9.1 on the Richter scale. It was the world’s most powerful earthquake for 40 years, but because its epicenter was 100 miles (160 km) offshore, it did not itself produce the worst of the damage that day. Fifteen minutes later, a wall of water hit the western coast of Sumatra. By the end of the day, more than 200,000 people had been killed and a million left homeless in 11 countries, making the Indian Ocean tsunami the most destructive on record. The earthquake, in a subduction zone between two of Earth’s tectonic plates, tore a rift 745 miles (1,200 km) across the ocean floor and uplifted the seabed by about 16 ft (5 m). A huge volume of water was displaced and broad waves spread out across the sea surface, reaching a height of 50 ft (15 m) in the shallow water of nearby shores. For coastal populations across the Indian Ocean, there was little time to escape to high ground. Even distant coasts received no warning of the approach of the tsunami, due to the absence of any planning for such an event. Natural warning signs helped some to survive. These included the earthquake itself and the retreat of the sea up to 11/2 miles (2.5 km) from the coast a few minutes before the first wave struck. Dealing with the aftermath of shattered buildings, flooded land, polluted water supplies, blocked harbors, and displaced people required a huge relief and reconstruction effort that was scheduled to continue for several years.
SEVERED TRAIN TRACK Eight hundred people died when a train was washed from a coastal railroad track near the town of Galle in southern Sri Lanka.
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DAMAGE PREVENTION Mangrove saplings are prepared for planting along the shore near Banda Aceh, Indonesia. Mangrove forests protected some coasts against the 2004 tsunami by absorbing most of its power before it reached settlements.
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
EARLY WARNING In November 2005, the first two tsunami warning buoys were installed off Indonesia. These are vital components of a planned Indian Ocean early warning system to match the one that is already operating in the Pacific.
Time after earthquake (hours) 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
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TYPE
Volcanic islands
AREA
1,800 square miles (4,550 square km)
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
2
The Mascarene Islands, Mauritius and Réunion, are the largest and youngest islands associated with the Mascarene Plateau, rising 21,300 ft (6,500 m) above the sea floor. Like the older banks of the plateau to the northeast and the Rodrigues Ridge to the east, they are volcanic in origin, having formed above a deep FRINGING REEF
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south. This continental fragment broke off from India around 65 million years ago as the current Mid-Indian Ridge started spreading.
INDIAN OCEAN H3
Mid-Indian Ridge LENGTH
2,100 miles (3,400 km)
AVERAGE HEIGHT ABOVE SEA FLOOR RATE OF SPREAD
5,000 ft (1,500 m)
11/4 in (3 cm) per year
The Indian and African plates are moving apart due to spreading at the Mid-Indian Ridge, which is marked by a series of transform fracture zones. Rifting was triggered 65 million years ago when the Réunion Hotspot erupted a vast amount of basalt through the Indian continental plate, forming a plateau called the Deccan Traps. An older spreading ridge, which first separated India from Africa, lies subsided between the Mascarene Basin and the Mascarene Plain.
A reef fringes the lagoon on the north coast of the volcanic island of Mauritius.
mantle hotspot. After the Deccan Traps eruption (see above), the Réunion Hotspot continued to punch through the crust as India moved north, leaving a trail of volcanic structures across the ocean floor, including the Laccadive and Maldive islands and the Chagos Bank on the other side of the MidIndian Ridge. Réunion’s main peak, Piton de la Fournaise, is one of the most active volcanoes in the world.
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
IDG
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SCALE 0
The Mozambique Channel separates Madagascar from the mainland of Africa. The area is home to the ancient coelacanth, found on both sides of the channel and off the Comoros. A counterclockwise gyre is found around the Comoros, and counterclockwise eddies dominate the flow in the main part of the channel. The warm Aghulas Current arises over the Natal Basin, fed by the South Equatorial Current.
Mauritius and Réunion
N2
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Zambezi, Rio Lúrio rivers
INDIAN OCEAN F6
DIA
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370 ft (110 m)
GRANITE BOULDERS IN THE SEYCHELLES
6
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386,000 square miles (1 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
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115
The main islands of the Seychelles— the Inner Islands—are made of granite, rising over 3,000 ft (900 m) above sea level on top of the Seychelles Bank. The other islands to the southwest—the Outer Islands— are coral islands (atolls) on top of seamounts. The Seychelles Bank is the most northerly part of the submarine Mascarene Plateau, which extends as far as the island of Réunion in the
AREA
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176 square miles (455 square km)
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
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is littered with scars documenting the breakup of Gondwana over the last 150 million years. The warm waters of the Indian Ocean have also proved to be an ideal environment for diverse marine life.
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the pacific ocean
THE BERING SEA AND GULF OF ALASKA
Bering Sea AREA
of the North Pacific are highly productive, supporting a rich fishery. Geologically, the area is dominated by a subduction zone, and the area’s volcanoes and earthquakes pose an ever-present danger.
INFLOWS
Aleutian Trench 2,000 miles (3,200 km) 26,600 ft (8,100 m)
RATE OF CLOSURE
3 in (8 cm) per year
The Bering Sea is bounded to the south by the Aleutian Islands. On the Pacific side of the islands lies the Aleutian Trench, marking where the Pacific Plate is plunging beneath the North American Plate. It is this subduction zone that gives rise to the volcanic arc of islands, the most northerly link in the Pacific Ring of Fire. The trench continues to the east,
SEALS IN THE ALEUTIAN ISLANDS
where the contact is between ocean crust and continental crust. The largest volcanic event of the 20th century was the eruption of Mount Katmai on the Alaskan Peninsula in 1912. This boundary can also produce powerful earthquakes such as the event that destroyed part of Anchorage in 1964.
A
.
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20,021 ft (6,102 m)
Pacific Ocean; Yukon, Anadyr’ rivers
The Bering Sea is named after a Danish navigator in the Russian Navy, who explored the area in 1741. It lies between mainland Asia and North America, and is bounded by the Aleutian Islands to the south and linked to the Arctic Ocean in the north by the narrow Bering Strait. There is a flow of cold Arctic water south through this strait, feeding a counterclockwise circulation. The main freshwater input is the Yukon River, which has deposited an extensive delta at its mouth. The Bering Sea is one of the world’s richest fisheries, helping Alaska account
PACIFIC OCEAN
MAXIMUM DEPTH
890,000 square miles (2.3 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
T H E C O L D , ST O R M Y SU B PO L AR SEAS
LENGTH
THE BERING STRAIT
This satellite image shows ice from the Chukchi Sea streaming south through the Bering Strait.
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for about half of the total US fish and shellfish catch. Harbor seals and gray whales also take advantage of these productive waters. In contrast to the deep ocean basin beneath the southwestern half of the sea, the broad continental shelf in the northwest is very shallow. Much of this area formed a land bridge during the last ice age, when sea levels were up to 390 ft (120 m) lower than they are today. This route was ice-free for extended periods, allowing several species, including humans, to migrate from Asia to North America on foot for the first time.
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the pacific ocean
B %
THE NORTHWESTERN PACIFIC L I K E T H E B ER I N G SEA T O T H E N O R T H EAST ,
this part of the Pacific is shaped by subduction at the edge of the Pacific Plate. Volcanoes, earthquakes, and tsunamis present a risk to human life, particularly in the densely populated islands of Japan. PACIFIC OCEAN E4
Sea of Okhotsk AREA
600,000 square miles (1.6 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
11,063 ft (3,372 m)
Sea of Japan/East Sea; Amur, Uda, Okhota, Penzhina rivers
INFLOWS
A subarctic shelf sea, the Sea of Okhotsk is a branch of the northwestern Pacific. It is enclosed to the north by the Asian landmass, bounded to the east by the Kurile
Islands, and linked in the south to the Sea of Japan/East Sea by two narrow straits. Navigation of the sea is restricted by sea ice in the winter, when ice formation on ship hulls also presents a danger to shipping. The southern part of the sea is notorious for its sea fogs throughout the year. The Sea of Okhotsk is very productive, accounting for nearly 70 percent of Russia’s East Asian fish catch. It is home to several endangered species of marine life, including Kurile harbor seals and gray whales. The Okhotsk Plate includes the continental crust of the Kamchatka Peninsula, with its string of volcanoes, and the islands of Sakhalin and Hokkaido. In much of the area, the sea floor is quite shallow, but it is deeper in the Kurile Basin, where the ocean crust has stretched and thinned.
HUMAN IMPACT
Ice can pose a hazard to shipping from November to June, with its location dependent on winds and ocean currents.
PACIFIC OCEAN F5 AND E8
Kurile and Japan Trenches LENGTH
2,390 miles (3,850 km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
26,575 ft (8,100 m)
RATE OF CLOSURE
3 in (8 cm) per year
Subduction at the Kurile Trench has produced volcanoes along the Kamchatka Peninsula, as well as the volcanic island arc of the Kuriles. The Kuriles form an almost complete submarine ridge between the island of Hokkaido and Kamchatka, with only two deep water channels from the Pacific into the Sea of Okhotsk. The
A rush to exploit rich oil and gas deposits on the island of Sakhalin Island started in 1996. The area is now the largest recipient of foreign investment in Russia, and oil production is expanding offshore into the Sea of Okhotsk. The large amount of construction in such a short time has raised concerns about the impact on this wilderness environment, including disturbance of the marine life of the Sea of Okhotsk.
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
378,000 square miles (978,000 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
12,276 ft (3,743 m)
East China Sea; Tumen, Ishikari, Shinano, Agano, Mogami, Teshio rivers
INFLOWS
Circulation within the Sea of Japan (also known as the East Sea) is counterclockwise, with warm water entering from the East China Sea through the Korea Strait. There are rich fishing grounds here and in the north. Squid are among the species sought by Japanese and Korean fishermen, who attract the animals
800 ft (250 m) 1,600 ft (500 m) 3,300 ft (1,000 m) 6,500 ft (2,000 m) 9,800 ft (3,000 m)
2
16,400 ft (5,000 m)
land seamount sea depth maximum depth on map tectonic plate boundary
3
.
This partly finished pipeline will eventually link offshore oil fields with Sakhalin and mainland Russia.
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Large craters, such as the flooded center of this island, form when a volcano’s magma chamber collapses or explodes.
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PACIFIC OCEAN G6
Northwest Pacific Basin AREA
7 4ONGHAE
2.4 million square miles (6.3 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
3/54( +/2%!
21,800 ft (6,650 m)
Bering Sea, Philippine Sea
The Oyashio Current (from the Japanese for “mother stream”) brings cold water south from the Bering Sea, along the western edge of the Northwest Pacific Basin, forming the western arm of the subarctic gyre. Where the Oyashio Current meets the warm waters of the Kuroshio Current (“black stream”) off Japan, there is a productive fishery.
(UNGNAM
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Sea of Japan/ East Sea
to the surface at night using powerful lights. The continental shelf is slightly wider on the eastern side than on the western side, and particularly narrow off the coast of Korea. There are three main basins: the Yamato Basin in the east, the Japan Basin in the north, and the Tsushima Basin in the southwest. Between these basins lies the Yamato Ridge, possibly a remnant of the spreading center that opened up the sea. The Sea of Japan/East Sea is a geologically complex basin bisected by the junction between the Okhotsk Plate and the Eurasian Plate. In 1983, a magnitude-7.7 earthquake on the sea floor off northern Honshu triggered a destructive tidal wave that reached a height of 46 ft (14 m) at the coast, killing 107 people in Japan and Korea.
KEY
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PACIFIC OCEAN C7
highest Kurile island is Atlasov, a symmetrical cone rising to 7,670 ft (2,340 m) above sea level. The islands of Honshu and Hokkaido represent a more mature island arc, where crustal thickening has resulted from prolonged subduction at the Japan Trench and the joining of multiple island arcs. With so much tectonic activity in the area, earthquakes are a constant danger. More than 100,000 people were killed and nearly 2 million made homeless in Japan’s worst earthquake, a magnitude-8 event that devastated Tokyo and Yokohama in 1923.
.
OIL EXPLORATION
SUPPLY LINE DANGEROUS SEA ICE
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continental shelf off the coast of northern China. Warm water flows through the area from the south, feeding the Pacific’s western boundary current, the Kuroshio Current, which allows the survival of the world’s most northerly colonies of coral in the coastal waters of Japan. The area is vulnerable to cyclones moving in from the southwest.
AREA
290,000 square miles (751,000 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
8,912 ft (2,717 m)
South China Sea, Philippine Sea, Yangtze River
The East China Sea is a warm, shallow, productive shelf sea that lies between the Chinese mainland and the Ryukyu Islands. It is linked to the South China Sea through the Taiwan Strait, and to the Sea of Japan through the Korea Strait. In spring and summer the warm Tsushima Current flows north through the Korea Strait, but this is suppressed by northerly winds during winter. The region is
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also occasionally hit by typhoons (hurricanes) during the summer (see pp. 71–72). The continental shelf beneath the South China Sea extends a long way from shore, partly due to sediments deposited by the Yangtze (Chang Jiang), Asia’s longest river. The Yangtze is navigable by ocean-going ships up to 1,000 miles (1,600 km) inland, and China’s main port, Shanghai, lies at its mouth. Fishing is an important source of income for the region, and the East China Sea is a shipping route between the South China Sea, Japan, and the north Pacific. There are also deposits of natural gas beneath the sea floor of the East China Sea, which China started developing in 2003.
RE NCH
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Yellow Sea 205,000 square miles (530,000 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
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338 ft (103 m)
Yellow, Yangtze, Liao He, Luan He, Yalu, Han rivers INFLOWS
Enclosed to the north, the Yellow Sea is an extension of the East China Sea, lying between the Chinese coast and the Korean Peninsula. It gets its name from the sand carried in suspension by the waters of the Yellow River (Huang He), the largest inflowing river. The sea is very shallow, and tidal ranges along the Korean side are some of the largest in the world.These strong tides also contribute to the color of the sea by stirring up sediment that has settled on the sea floor. The area around the northernmost bay of Bo Hai is one of the most industrialized in China; Dalian is China’s third-largest port. RYUKYU ISLANDS
The climate of the Ryukyu Islands is subtropical, with many of the islands fringed by coral reefs.
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Ryukyu Trench LENGTH
868 miles (1,398 km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
24,476 ft (7,460 m)
RATE OF CLOSURE
21/2–3 in (6–8 cm) per year
The Philippine oceanic plate is in contact with the Eurasian Plate to the south of Japan, resulting in a subduction zone marked by the Ryukyu Trench and the Nankai Trough.Volcanic island arcs have resulted to the northwest of the trenches. The Ryukyu Islands are a relatively young island arc compared with the mature arc of the Japanese islands of Honshu and Hokkaido, which has grown to a considerable land mass. The Ryukyu Islands include Okinawa, home to a large American naval base.
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T H E N AM E M I C R O N ESI A APPL I ES T O AN AR EA in the western Pacific, north of the equator. Its stretches to the Caroline and Mariana islands in the west, and Nauru, the Marshall Islands, and Kiribati (or Gilbert) Islands to the east.
3,300 ft (1,000 m)
PACIFIC OCEAN B4
6,500 ft (2,000 m)
M FT
Philippine Sea
9,800 ft (3,000 m)
2
16,400 ft (5,000 m)
.
AREA
1.9 million square miles (5 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
land
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400
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The southern members of the Mariana Islands are limestone platforms with fringing coral reefs.
I
TYPE
Coral atoll islands
AREA
70 square miles (180 square km)
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
Bikini were chosen for their remote location as the site of American nuclear bomb tests in the 1940s and 1950s. Several ships were sunk in these tests, but their wrecks are now considered safe for recreational diving.
34
Most of the seamounts scattered across the floor of the western Pacific are far from any plate boundary. The seamounts are found in groups, often strung out in lines running southeast– northwest—the direction of motion of the Pacific Plate. They are caused by hotspots in Earth’s mantle, which periodically punch through the ocean crust to form volcanoes. Some may reach the surface as islands and in the Marshall Islands, coral atolls were formed as the plate moved away from the hot spot and the volcanic islands subsided. The atolls of Enewetak and
GARDEN EELS
These garden eels are among the sea life to be found at the bottom of Rongelap Atoll in the Marshall Islands.
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
A
%
35,827 ft (10,920 m), this is the deepest known part of the ocean. It was named after a British survey ship that measured its depth in 1951. It was explored for the first time in 1960 by the deep-sea submersible Trieste, which found flatfish and shrimp living at the bottom of the trench.
At the eastern edge of the Philippine Plate lies the volcanic island arc of the Northern Mariana Islands. To the east lies the Mariana Trench, where the Pacific Plate is subducting beneath the Philippine Plate. The Mariana Trench includes Challenger Deep—at
PACIFIC OCEAN I6
S NT OU
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Philippine Basin is the deepest and oldest, separated from the West Mariana Basin by the Kyushu–Palau Ridge. This ridge, and the Iwo-Jima and West Mariana ridges, are the remnants of island arcs associated with ancient subduction zones.
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The Philippine Sea stretches east to west between the Marianas Islands and the Philippines, and from north to south between Japan and Palau. This warm sea is swept by the North Equatorial Current, which turns north to form the Kuroshio Current. The water becomes very warm in the summer, and the area is a breeding ground for typhoons. The Philippine Sea is underlain by the Philippine Plate, an oceanic plate that is subducting at the Philippine and Ryukyu trenches. The plate is split into two main basins. The westernmost
Mariana Trench
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35,580 ft (10,540 m)
Pacific Ocean, South China Sea
470
the pacific ocean
MIDWAY AND HAWAII
Hawaiian Islands
in the central North Pacific, with the Kuroshio Extension flowing eastward in the north, turning south in the east, and returning as the North Equatorial Current south of the Hawaiian Islands. The seafloor is dominated by seamount chains, mostly running from northwest to southeast, and fracture zones, oriented roughly east–west.
O C EAN C I R C U L AT I O N I S C L O C K W I SE
PACIFIC OCEAN B1
TYPE
TYPE
Coral atoll islands
1,200 miles (2,000 km)
AREA
21/2 square miles (6.2 square km)
LENGTH
NUMBER OF SEAMOUNTS
17
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
The Emperor Seamounts stretch over 1,200 miles (2,000 km) from the northwestern Hawaiian Islands in the south to the Aleutian Trench in the north. They are the oldest part of the Emperor–Hawaii seamount chain—more than 40 million years old—with age and depth increasing to the north. The individual seamounts are named after emperors of Japan.
A
4
These four islands form a coral atoll that lies roughly halfway between North America and Asia. Its position has made it useful for a variety of purposes over the years, first as a telegraph cable and radio station, then as a flying boat stopover, and as an important naval and air station in wartime. Today it is administered by the US government as a wildlife refuge.
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6,400 square miles (16,600 square km)
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Midway Islands
Volcanic seamount chain
TYPE
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
PACIFIC OCEAN C3
Emperor Seamounts
volcano, the largest on Earth. From its base on the sea floor it rises about 55,800 ft (17,000 m)—much taller than Mount Everest. Its weight has caused the underlying ocean crust to sag, producing the Hawaiian Trough to the north and east of the main island. The seas around Hawaii are tropical, and warm enough for coral reefs to grow. The prevailing winds in this region are the trade winds from the northeast, making the northeast coasts of the islands considerably wetter and greener.
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GULF OF CALIFORNIA south in the western North Pacific, forming the western arm of the North Pacific Gyre. South of the Tropic of Cancer it sweeps west to become the North Equatorial Current. Against the California coast, a cold coastal current runs north. The floor of the western Pacific slopes gently away from North America, scarred by long fracture zones. T H E C AL I FO R N I A C U R R EN T FL OW S
San Francisco Bay 1,600 square miles (4,160 square km)
INFLOWS
1,970 ft (600 m)
San Joaquin, Sacramento rivers
San Francisco Bay and its associated water bodies form the world’s largest natural harbor. In addition to San Francisco itself, there are major ports in Oakland, Richmond, Stockton, Sacramento, and San Pablo Bay. The bay is an estuary, containing large areas of salt marsh that support a number of endangered species. It is famous for its sea fogs, which arise when sea breezes blow over cold inshore waters.
THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE
D
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Monterey Bay AREA
620 square miles (1,600 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
10,700 ft (3,250 m)
Pacific Ocean
Monterey Bay is one of the most diverse marine ecosystems in the world, and is home to a variety of fish, invertebrate, seabird, and mammal species, including sea otters, harbor and elephant seals, bottlenose dolphins, and turtles. It is also famous for its fish-processing industry, which grew up in the early part of the 20th century around Cannery Row. The bay is the site of one of the longest undersea canyons in the world, Monterey Canyon, which reaches a depth of more than 9,800 ft (3,000 m) and runs 60 miles (100 km) offshore. A mud volcano north of the canyon is the source of cold hydrocarbon seeps (see pp.188–89), which support an ecosystem based on metabolizing sulfide compounds, rather than using sunlight for energy. Similar deep-sea communities are found at hydrothermal vents on the mid-ocean ridges.
PACIFIC OCEAN E2
Gulf of California AREA
62,000 square miles (160,000 square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
10,000 ft (3,050 m)
Fuerte, Sonora, Yaqui, Colorado rivers
The Gulf of California was originally named the Sea of Cortez by Spanish explorers and is still known locally by that name. It marks the boundary between the North American and Pacific plates. The peninsula of Baja California lies on the Pacific Plate and is moving northwest, away from Mexico, at about 2 in (5 cm) each year. To the north, large earthquakes are quite frequent along the San Andreas Fault. The waters of the gulf support a rich ecosystem and a healthy commercial fishery. In addition to the native species, migratory visitors include humpback whales, manta rays, and leatherback turtles. The California gray whale completes the longest migration of any mammal, spending a few weeks each year in breeding grounds off Baja California, before returning to the Bering Sea, 5,000 miles (8,000 km) away.
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MELANESIA
PACIFIC OCEAN F1
Bismarck Sea
for “black islands.” The area includes the islands north of Australia, from Celebes and New Guinea in the west, to Fiji and Samoa in the east. The surrounding seas are tropical, their warm waters fed by the westward flow of the South Equatorial Current. The region is geologically complex, with some parts volcanically active. T H E N AM E M EL AN ESI A C O M ES FR O M T H E GR EEK
the Solomon Sea appears to consist of one or two very small tectonic plates (microplates) of oceanic origin. The Solomon Sea Microplate is spreading from the area of the Pockington Trough and rotating clockwise, subducting to the north and possibly to the southwest.Volcanic activity is particularly intense off the New Georgia Islands, where the spreading ridge is being subducted: the submarine volcano Kavachi breached the surface explosively in 2002. On the other side of the sea, the tectonic upheavals have resulted in uplift of New Guinea’s Huon Peninsula, where raised coral terraces are found some distance inland.
PACIFIC OCEAN F2
Solomon Sea 278,000 square miles (720,000 square km) 29,300 ft (8,940 m)
Pacific Ocean, Coral Sea
INFLOWS
The Solomon Sea lies between the Solomon Islands and the island of New Guinea, with the island of New Britain to the north and the Louisiade Archipelago to the south. The area is geologically complex, forming the remains of a closing ocean basin caught between the Australian Plate moving north and the Pacific Plate moving west. The floor of A %QUATOR
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The Bismarck Sea lies off the north coast of New Guinea. It is surrounded by volcanic islands, the largest being New Britain. The underlying Bismarck Microplate is caught between the Australian Plate, moving north, and the Pacific and Caroline plates, moving west. The northern islands of the archipelago arise from the subduction of the Caroline and Pacific plates, marked by the Manus Trench to the north.Volcanoes on the south side of the sea are currently more active, arising from the subduction of the Solomon Sea Microplate at the New Britain Trench. To the east of the Bismarck Sea lies the Ontong Java Rise. This submarine plateau is one of the world’s largest expanses of igneous rock. It is composed of flood basalts, some of which date back to 120 million years ago.
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251,000 square miles (650,000 square km)
AVERAGE DEPTH
Coral Sea, Timor Sea, Banda Sea
GREAT BARRIER REEF
PACIFIC OCEAN G3
The largest coral reef structure in the world, the Great Barrier Reef stretches for more than 1,200 miles (2,000 km).
Coral Sea AREA
1.8 million square miles (4.8 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
30,070 ft (9,165 m)
West Central Pacific Ocean; Fly, Purari, Kikori rivers INFLOWS
This tropical sea earns its name from the presence of coral reefs along most of its coasts. The Great Barrier Reef (see p.160) grows out to the edge of the Australian continental shelf, on the western side of the sea. Warm water enters from the Pacific, circulating weakly before leaving through the Torres Strait to the west, or to the
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south as the East Australia Current. The eastern and northern sides of the Coral Sea are marked by deep trenches, where the oceanic part of the Australian Plate is subducting. Volcanism has resulted in the Solomon Islands and the Vanuatu chain. Explosive eruptions in these islands can create pumice, a volcanic rock that floats due to gas bubbles trapped inside. Lumps of pumice are sometimes washed up on the western shore of the Coral Sea.
The Fiji Plateau is the thickest part of the Fiji Plate. The islands of Fiji were originally part of a continuous volcanic island arc alongside Vanuatu and the Solomons. They were moved east when the Pacific Plate changed its direction of motion, triggering the creation of new ocean crust in the North Fiji Basin. The Hunter Ridge to the south marks the transform fracture that allowed this eastward motion, while the Vityaz Trench to the north marks the subduction zone that created the islands, though the trench is now inactive. Over time a substantial platform of limestone accumulated around the original volcanic islands, as they were uplifted, faulted, and folded by the opening of the young, buoyant North Fiji Basin. Growth of the platform continues today, thanks to the coral reefs that fringe Fiji’s hundreds of islands.
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Lying over a shallow continental shelf, the Arafura Sea marks the boundary between the Pacific and Indian oceans. During the Indian summer monsoon, water flows westward into the Indian Ocean, pulled by the South Equatorial Current, but the flow is reversed when the Equatorial Counter Current is active during the Indian winter.
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30,900 square miles (80,000 square km)
AREA
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CLOSE ENCOUNTER
A hawksbill turtle swims past a group of scuba divers in the Ras Mohammed protected area near the popular Red Sea diving resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.
475
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THE DIVERS’ CODE
WRECKS It is not just the living world that attracts divers. In some parts of the ocean, such as here in the Caribbean, the sea floor is littered with wrecked ships. Exploring the hulks can be like traveling back in time.
DIVE SITES
REEFS Coral reefs provide some of the most spectacular sights on Earth. A healthy reef positively teems with a wide variety of wildlife, including many brightly colored fish species, such as these raccoon butterflyfish on a reef in Hawaii. ECOTOURISM Some conservation-minded divers spend their vacations assisting scientists in their research of coral reefs. LOCAL ECONOMIES Residents of prime dive locations can benefit by offering diving services. But if a location becomes too popular, the sheer number of visitors can cause severe damage to the reefs.
FEEDING SHARKS The feeding of top predators, such as this Caribbean reef shark, is a complex issue. Although the behavior of the sharks is altered by such activities, such diving trips are becoming increasingly popular in many locations, resulting indirectly in the protection of the sharks by local operators.
INTERACTING WITH WILDLIFE
how to respond if they lose their mask. Hand signals are used to communicate underwater.
BAD PRACTICE A boy diving in the Red Sea touches a spiny pufferfish, causing it to inflate. The handling of marine wildlife can harm both the animal and the diver and is discouraged by the Divers’ Code.
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The vast majority of modern dive operations and tourist authorities insist on a strict set of guidelines to minimize the effect of too many divers on reefs. The Divers’ Code includes the following points: no contact with coral; maintain buoyancy control so that accidental contact with the reef is avoided; no collection of shells, coral, or other mementos; no touching, harassing, or feeding of any marine animals; and an exclusion zone is to be maintained SAFETY FIRST around large marine A dive instructor teaches novice divers animals, such as whales.
DIVING ACTIVITIES
BENEFITS AND DRAWBACKS
The pioneering work in 1943 of French divers Jacques Cousteau and Emile Gagnan in creating scuba (selfcontained underwater breathing apparatus) moved diving away from being the domain of the military, scientists, and a privileged few and opened up the wonders of the underwater world to a wider public. Although there is an element of risk—diving is still classed as an extreme sport by many insurance companies—a vast array of training agencies and courses exist to assist the potential diver in taking up the sport safely. In line with the increased accessibility of diving and a burgeoning interest in the marine environment, dive operations have sprung up in every location where there is a combination of a tourist market and easy access to a body of water suitable for scuba diving. In the US alone, the number of active divers is about 5 million. The modern diver is faced with a bewildering array of choices when it comes to the dive experience itself. The simplest form of diving is a course that is based within a resort, which supplies all of the equipment and training, and guides the diver around local sites. More specialized is the dedicated dive vacation, where the qualified diver seeks out a location specifically to explore local attractions. Some diving enthusiasts choose to base themselves on dive vessels that explore some of the more remote locations of the undersea world. For the most committed divers, it is possible to join a dedicated diving expedition organization, during which conservation or surveying work may be undertaken at a remote location for a few weeks or even several months.
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POLYNESIA
KEY sea level
1 800 ft (250 m)
.
1,600 ft (500 m) 3,300 ft (1,000 m) 6,500 ft (2,000 m)
T H E FL O O R O F T H E SO U T H W EST PAC I FI C is dotted with chains of islands and seamounts, and cut by major fracture zones. Its deepest part lies in the Tonga Trench, where the Pacific Plate is subducting beneath the Australian Plate. The counterclockwise South Pacific Gyre controls the ocean currents, with eastward Equatorial Countercurrents north and south of the equator.
9,800 ft (3,000 m)
M FT
NE :O
PACIFIC OCEAN G4
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16,400 ft (5,000 m)
land
Marquesas Islands TYPE
Volcanic islands
AREA
490 square miles (1,270 square km)
seamount
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
sea depth maximum depth on map tectonic plate boundary
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Cook Islands
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AREA
93 square miles (240 square km)
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
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15
The Cook Islands are split into two groups: the low-lying coral atolls of the northern group, most of which rise from the Manihiki Plateau; and the mainly high volcanic islands in the south. The largest island, Rarotonga,
ONE
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Despite this isolation, the islands suffered the effects of an earthquake in Alaska in 1946 when they were hit by the resultant tsunami, which rose up to 40 ft (12 m) high in some places.
15
The Marquesas Islands are volcanic in origin, overlying a mantle hotspot, with high mountain peaks and ridges. They lie in the path of the strong South Equatorial Current, flowing from the east, producing eroded coastlines, with steep cliffs dotted with sea caves. Coral reefs are limited to a few sheltered bays. The Marquesas lie farther from a continental landmass than any other island group on Earth.
4
477
ERODED VOLCANIC COASTLINE
rises 2,140 ft (652 m) above sea level and 14,800 ft (4,500 m) above the ocean floor. The islands were settled in about 300 bc by people originating from eastern Melanesia, who migrated via Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa. Polynesians were expert ocean explorers and perfected the use of many navigation aids at a time when European mariners relied on keeping the land in sight. Their techniques included using the stars; knowledge of currents, winds, and wave patterns; and the flight of birds. Captain James Cook was the first European to sight the Cook Islands in 1773. Russian sailors named the islands in his honor in the 19th century.
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Like most of the Southern Cook Islands, Rarotonga has a fringing coral reef several hundred yards offshore, which protects a shallow lagoon and coastal plain.
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Coral atoll islands
AREA
340 square miles (885 square km)
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The Tuamotu Islands are the longest chain of coral atolls in the world, stretching over 1,200 miles (2,000 km). The Tuamotus were settled by Polynesians by ad 700. Ferdinand Magellan was the first European to chart the group in 1521. The islands became known for their rare black
pearls, and these still form a major part of the economy. The Tuamotu Islands are part of French Polynesia and the islands of Mururoa and Fantgataufa were used as sites for about 200 French nuclear weapon tests between 1966 and 1996. The atolls were formed as volcanic islands subsided, leaving behind their fringing coral reefs. The islands rise from the Tuamotu Ridge, a plateau of volcanic material formed about 63–40 million years ago. The Gambier Islands at the southeast end of the ridge are younger, with their volcanic peaks still standing above sea level.
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GALÁPAGOS ISLANDS flows into the eastern equatorial Pacific from the west, feeding a counterclockwise gyre over the Guatemala Basin. From the south, the Humboldt Current feeds into the South Equatorial Current, which runs westward across the Pacific. The area is underlain by two plates, the Cocos and Nazca, which are remnants of the original eastern Pacific plate.
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
T H E EQ UAT O R I AL C O U N T ER C U R R EN T
PACIFIC OCEAN B2
East Pacific Rise LENGTH
5,600 miles (9,000 km)
HEIGHT ABOVE SEA FLOOR RATE OF SPREAD
PACIFIC OCEAN C1
Middle America Trench
3,280 ft (1,000 m)
41/2–6 in (11–15 cm) per year
The East Pacific Rise is the fastestspreading mid-ocean ridge in the world, producing a broad, gently-sloping ridge with few transform offsets. It was here that the first submarine hydrothermal vents, or black smokers (see p.188-89), were discovered. These vents give rise to oases of life on the deep-ocean floor, supporting complex communities of tube worms, clams, shrimp, and crabs, fueled by nutrients in the vent fluids.
LENGTH
'
7
1,700 miles (2,750 km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH
21,858 ft (6,662 m)
RATE OF CLOSURE
31/2 in (9 cm) per year
The Cocos Plate is subducting beneath the North American and Caribbean plates at the Middle America Trench. A chain of volcanoes has arisen along Central America’s western coast, with volcanism most active in the southern part of the subduction zone behind the trench. Earthquakes in the area are triggered by plate movement.
PACIFIC OCEAN D3
Galápagos Islands TYPE
Volcanic islands
AREA
3,030 square miles (7,850 square km)
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
19
The Galápagos Islands first appeared on maps drawn by Flemish cartographers Abraham Ortelius and Gerardus Mercator in 1570. The Galápagos take their name from the old Spanish word for tortoise, as early visitors found giant tortoises roaming the islands. There are many other species that have made unique adaptations to the local environment, including the marine iguana. It is the only iguana to feed in the sea, diving up to 50 ft (15 m) to forage for marine algae. The cold waters of the Humboldt Current allow Galápagos penguins to survive at the equator. The islands are the result of volcanic eruptions above a mantle hotspot. The same hotspot is
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responsible for driving the Cocos and Nazca plates apart at the Colon Ridge. The Nazca Plate on which the islands sit is moving eastward, so the oldest of the islands are found in the east. They have been volcanically extinct for several million years, but some of the younger islands are still active volcanoes. Farther east, the submarine Carnegie Ridge is also built from Galápagos Hotspot material. GALÁPAGOS ISLAND IGUANA
Study of the islands’ unique animals, including marine iguanas, helped British naturalist Charles Darwin to formulate his theory of evolution.
easter island
EASTER ISLAND
Easter Island
the cold Humboldt Current flows north up the coast of South America, forming the eastern arm of the South Pacific Gyre. It then turns west in the tropics, feeding the South Equatorial Current. In some years, this current is weakened and warm water pools in the east, disrupting weather patterns over a wide area of the Pacific Ocean.
Peru-Chile Trench 3,650 miles (5,900 km) 26,474 ft (8,069 m)
RATE OF CLOSURE
3 in (7.8 cm) per year
The Peru–Chile Trench (also called the Atacama Trench) is the longest ocean trench, marking the point at which the Nazca Plate meets the South American Plate. The Nazca Plate is primarily dense ocean crust and so is being subducted beneath the more buoyant South American continental plate. The South American crust has been deformed and thickened A
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Easter Island’s enigmatic moai statues were carved from soft volcanic rock taken from Ranu Raraku, one of the island’s many volcanic craters.
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Easter Island lies near the East Pacific Rise, which separates the Pacific Plate to the west from the Nazca Plate to the east. The island is the highest point of the Easter Fracture Zone, a series of ridges and trenches marking a transform fault running 3,650 miles (5,900 km) across the floor of the South Pacific, from the Peru–Chile Trench in the east to the Tuamotu Archipelago (see p.477) in the west. Easter Island was named in 1722 by Dutch sailors, who came across it on Easter Sunday. It had been settled at least 1,000 years earlier by Polynesians, who today call the island Rapa Nui. The island is famous for its giant stone statues, which are known as moai, found in groups along the coast. About half of the 900 statues remain unfinished in the quarry—it seems statue-carving stopped abruptly
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63 square miles (164 square km)
#(),%
MAXIMUM DEPTH
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AREA
.A ZC A
LENGTH
TYPE
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
by the convergence, creating the Andes Mountains. Melting of the rocks around the subducting slab has led to volcanism and many of the Andes’ tallest peaks are volcanoes. Earthquakes along the trench produced nine large tsunamis during the 20th century, resulting in more than 2,000 deaths. The trade winds drive surface waters offshore throughout most years, leading to upwelling of nutrient-rich deep water off the coast of Peru. This upwelling makes the water very productive and yields large fish catches, predominantly anchovies and sardines. Under El Niño (see pp.68–69) conditions, however, the wind direction reverses and the fish catch plummets.
PACIFIC OCEAN F2
about a century before the first European explorers arrived. It is thought that the island’s forests and soil became so depleted that the islanders’ society collapsed in a violent struggle over access to rapidly diminishing resources.
PACIFIC OCEAN B3
I N T H E EAST ER N SO U T H PAC I FI C ,
479
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SOUTHEAST AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND
& PACIFIC OCEAN B6
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LENGTH
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1
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62 miles (100 km)
T O T H E N O R T H EAST O F AU ST R AL I A , ocean
DEPTH
1,550 miles (2,500 km) 35,430 ft (10,800 m)
RATE OF CLOSURE
6–9 in (15–24 cm) per year
The Kermadec–Tonga Trench runs between the North Island of New Zealand and the island of Tonga. It is a subduction zone, where the Pacific Plate is converging with the Australian Plate. At its northern end, closure rates of 9 in (24 cm) per year have been measured—the fastest plate
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4
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motion yet recorded. The older oceanic crust of the Pacific Plate is sinking below the more buoyant, young oceanic crust of the Australian Plate. The Tonga Ridge and the older Lau Ridge to the west formed as arcs of volcanoes above the subduction zone.The rapid speed of this subduction has caused extension of the overriding Australian Plate and the opening of a back-arc basin (an isolated basin behind a subduction zone) between the two ridges, in the Lau Basin. Together with Fiji and Samoa, the 36 inhabited islands of Tonga are the cradle of the Polynesian seafaring culture, which had stretched across the South Pacific by the 12th century.
The Bass Strait separates Tasmania from Australia, overlying a shallow shelf around 160 ft (50 m) deep. Strong winds and currents from the Southern Ocean combine with the shallow depth to make its waters notoriously rough. Hundreds of ships were wrecked on its shores during the 19th century, before the erection of lighthouses made navigation safer. Natural gas fields were discovered beneath the eastern Bass Strait in the 1960s and 1990s.
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PACIFIC OCEAN G4
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Bass Strait MINIMUM WIDTH
currents flow from the east, feeding the warm East Australia Current, which sweeps south along the Australian coast, before turning east to flow north of New Zealand. South of New Zealand, the Antarctic Circumpolar Current flows from west to east. New Zealand straddles a major tectonic boundary between the Pacific and Australian plates.
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890,000 square miles (2.3 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
LORD HOWE ISLAND
The warm waters of the East Australia Current allow Lord Howe Island to host the world’s most southerly coral reef.
19,500 ft (5,945 m)
Southern Ocean, Coral Sea
This warm sea was discovered by Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1642, while looking for Terra Australis (the Southern Land). On this voyage he become the first European to reach the islands of Tasmania, New Zealand, Tonga, and Fiji. The area was not visited again until James Cook’s voyage in 1768. On a later voyage, in 1644, Tasman succeeded in finding the continent of Australia. The Tasman Sea has a subtropical climate in the north, but the influence of cold sub-Antarctic water makes it temperate in the south.
Southwest Pacific Basin AREA
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4ZEOFZ
PACIFIC OCEAN H3
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PACIFIC OCEAN C5
8.9 million square miles (23 million square km)
MAXIMUM DEPTH INFLOWS
18,500 ft 95,655 m)
Pacific Ocean, Southern Ocean
5
The Southwest Pacific Basin lies east of New Zealand and the Kermadec– Tonga Trench. It is bounded in the east by the East Pacific Rise (see p.478), in the south by the Pacific–Antarctic Rise, and in the north by the Polynesian island chains. The Louisville Ridge is the only significant chain of seamounts and much of the basin floor is an abyssal plain. There are extensive deposits of manganese in the northern and southern parts of the basin.
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TYPE
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AREA
103,700 square miles (268,680 square km)
NUMBER OF ISLANDS
2 main islands
(700 smaller islands)
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New Zealand separated from Australia and Antarctica 80 million years ago, and is now positioned at the boundary between the Pacific and Australian plates. The largely transverse Alpine Fault runs 435 miles (700 km) across the South Island. Crustal compression and distortion across a 155-mile(250-km-) wide zone has raised the Southern Alps over 13,000 ft (4,000 m) above sea level. The plate boundary continues north as the Hikurangi Trench, a classic subduction zone
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producing volcanism on North Island, and south as the Macquarie Ridge, where shallow subduction has uplifted the Australian Plate. The main islands of New Zealand are the highest points of an extensive area of continental crust that includes the Challenger Plateau, Chatham Rise, and Campbell Plateau. To the southeast, Campbell Plateau is the largest area of submerged continental crust in the world. Lord Howe Rise was left isolated between Australia and New Zealand by seafloor spreading in the Tasman Sea and by rifting in the New Caledonia Basin and Bellona Valley.
CAMPBELL ISLAND
The southernmost of New Zealand’s subantarctic islands, Campbell Island is primarily volcanic in origin.
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OCEAN CIRCULATION The eastward-flowing Antarctic Circumpolar Current is the strongest in the world. It flows up to 9,800 ft (3,000 m) deep and carries 4.8 million cubic ft (135,000 cubic meters) of water per second through Drake Passage. It diverts heat flowing from the equator, isolating Antarctica and causing the buildup of the thick Antarctic ice cap. Cold currents branch off up the eastern sides of the Indian, Atlantic, Pacific oceans. The Circumpolar Current (also known as the West Wind Drift) is driven by the prevailing westerly winds, which blow uninterrupted by any landmass. Wind speeds in the Southern Ocean are the highest in the world: the “roaring forties” give way to the “furious fifties” and the “screaming sixties” as one sails south.
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surrounds Antarctica and links the Indian, Atlantic, and Pacific oceans. Antarctica’s coast was not sighted until 1820, and its shores were not fully explored until the 20th century. The Southern Ocean is generally described as being south of 60° latitude, but is physically better defined by the extent of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current.
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Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf MAXIMUM THICKNESS
Weddell Sea 1.1 million square miles (2.8 million square km) 16,440 ft (5,012 m)
Southern Ocean, Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf, Larsen Ice Shelf
INFLOWS
YOUNG WEDDELL SEAL
ice west, then north up the Antarctic Peninsula, before turning east with the Circumpolar Current. The Antarctic continental shelf is at its widest here, with shallow banks extending out from under the Filchner–Ronne Ice Shelf.
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The Bellingshausen Sea is named after Fabian von Bellingshausen, an officer in the Imperial Russian Navy, who was the first to sight the coast of Antarctica, in 1820. It is one of several parts of the Southern Ocean that is rich in krill, the basis of a productive marine food chain.
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The Weddell Sea is named after British seal hunter James Weddell, who reached a latitude of 74°34’ South in 1832, the most southerly point that would be reached for the next 80 years. It is mostly covered with pack ice, even in summer, and is the source for 70 percent of the cold Antarctic bottom water. A clockwise gyre carries
INFLOWS
3,000 ft (900 m)
The Filchner Ice Shelf was first sighted by the German explorer Wilhelm Filchner in 1912. It lies to the east of Berkner Island. To the west of Berkner Island lies the Ronne Ice Shelf. It was charted from the air by American naval commander Finn Ronne in 1947. Together these two shelves make up the second-largest floating ice shelf by area, and the largest by volume. The bedrock of the ice-covered Berkner Island in fact lies below sea level. Although fed by glaciers from the continental ice cap, and grounded on its landward side, most of the area of the Filchner–Ronne Ice Shelf is floating in the Weddell Sea. The ice shelf itself is up to 3,000 ft (900 m) thick, and the underlying seafloor is up to 4,600 ft (1,400 m) deep.
SOUTHERN OCEAN D2
MAXIMUM DEPTH
MAXIMUM DEPTH
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INFLOWS
232,000 square miles (600,000 square km)
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166,000 square miles (430,000 square km)
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north from Antarctica toward South America, separating the Weddell Sea from the Bellingshausen Sea. At its northern end, a chain of islands marks the edge of the Antarctic Plate.
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SOUTHERN OCEAN D2
Ross Sea 370,000 square miles (960,000 square km)
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Southern Ocean, Ross Ice Shelf
The Ross Sea is named after the British naval officer James Clark Ross, who charted this part of the Antarctic coast in 1841. The volcanoes Mount Erebus and Mount Terror on Ross Island are named after the two ships under his command during this expedition. Ross Island is home to the largest scientific base on ICEBREAKER AT SEA
A Russian icebreaker is shown here among drifting ice in the Ross Sea, with the Transantarctic Mountains in the background.
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The southern half of the Ross Sea is overlain by the world’s largest floating ice shelf, the Ross Ice Shelf, which extends up to 280 miles (450 km) from the shore of Antarctica. The Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen started his successful expedition to the South Pole in 1911 by crossing this ice shelf. It ranges in thickness from about 820 ft (250 m) at the ice front to 2,600 ft (800 m) inland. Ice floats with most of its volume underwater, making the height of the ice front above sea level about 65–100 ft (20– 30 m). The shelf flows seaward at about 3,000 ft (900 m) per year, propelled by the accumulating weight of compacted snow that falls on the high plateau of the Antarctic Ice Sheet. Accumulation on the ice cap is thought to be balanced by iceberg calving at the front of Antarctica’s ice shelves and melting on their underside.
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ICE SHELF SEAS Ice-core drilling, seismic sounding, and ice-penetrating radar have all been used to measure the thickness of floating ice shelves from the surface. Now, autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) are being deployed to explore the “cave seas” beneath the ice. They are able to gather more detailed information about sea floor depth, ice thickness, ocean temperature, pressure, and salinity.
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ice-shelf breakup ICE SHELVES IN RETREAT
MELTWATER POOL In the summer, meltwater collects in low-lying parts of the surface of an ice shelf, including crevasses and depressions. Melting also occurs on the underside.
CRACKING UP
Ice shelves cover 44 percent of the Antarctic coastline. The floating extensions of Antarctica’s continental ice sheet, they are continually pushed away from the land by the weight of accumulating snow. They typically advance over the ocean for years or decades, until the front of the ice shelf breaks off under its own weight to form a tabular iceberg. This advance and retreat is part of a natural cycle, but in the Antarctic Peninsula small ice shelves have recently suffered catastrophic collapses as a result of a regional warming of 4.5˚F (2.5˚C) over the last 50 years (see below and right). Although the loss of floating ice does not affect global sea levels, it seems that the adjacent continental ice sheet may become unstable if it loses the “buffer zone” provided by an ice shelf. After the Larsen B Ice Shelf collapsed in 2002, scientists measured nearby glaciers flowing between two and eight times faster than they had before. It is not yet clear whether the larger Ronne and Ross ice shelves act as a similar brake on the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. If the regional warming continues and the West Antarctic Ice Sheet collapses as a result, global sea levels could rise more than 16 ft (5 m), threatening densely populated coastal areas worldwide.
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The Larsen Ice Shelf occupies the eastern shore of the Antarctic Peninsula. In 1995, the northern part of the ice shelf, Larsen A, broke into tiny fragments during a storm. In 2002, most of the central part, Larsen B, disintegrated in a similar manner over a few weeks. At the moment, the largest Weddell part of the shelf, Sea Larsen C to the south, seems to be Ronne stable, although it Ice Shelf Larsen East Antarctica ra n Ice Shelf too lost a large san tar West area in 1986. c Antarctica ti c
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DISAPPEARING ICE SHELF
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CRACK IN LARSEN A The additional weight of meltwater may increase the pressure at the base of a crevasse, causing it to penetrate deeper into the ice shelf and to widen.
LARSEN B COLLAPSE Extensive meltwater pools are visible in a satellite image of the Larsen B Ice Shelf taken on January 31, 2002, before it broke up (top). The collapse itself, on March 7, 2002, is shown in the lower image. The ice shelf broke into a multitude of small fragments, and a few larger ones, which quickly dispersed into the Weddell Sea. It is possible that meltwater helped push surface crevasses through the entire 720 ft (220 m) thickness of the Larsen B Ice Shelf.
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Area of Larsen B collapse in 2002
ATL AS OF THE OCEANS
ICEBERG B-15 One of the largest icebergs ever seen, at 185 miles (300 km) long, 25 miles (40 km) wide, and 200 ft (60 m) high, B-15 broke off from the Ross Ice Shelf in March 2000. It drifted around the Ross Sea for several years, disrupting navigation and penguin migration. By November 2005, it had broken into several smaller pieces and moved into the Southern Ocean.
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glossary
GLOSSARY A abyssal Relating to oceanic depths greater than about 6,500 ft (2,000 m). The abyssal plain is the flattish plain at 13,000–20,000 ft (4,000–6,000 m) that forms the bed of most ocean basins. The abyssal zone is the region of both seabed and open water between 6,500 ft (2,000 m) and the abyssal plain. See also bathyal, hadal. air mass A body of air with relatively uniform temperature and pressure, forming above a given region of Earth’s surface. Its characteristics derive from this surface region and are distinct from surrounding air masses. “Tropical maritime” and “polar continental” are examples. albedo The extent to which incoming radiation is reflected from a surface. Ice has a high albedo, reflecting most of the Sun’s radiation reaching it. algae Simple plants and plantlike protists that can photosynthesize, ranging from seaweeds (macroalgae) to microscopic plankton (microalgae). Some types of algae, such as green microalgae and green seaweeds, are often classified as plants. Red and brown seaweeds are also algae, but are often classified separately. Singular alga. See also cyanobacteria, photosynthesis, protists, seaweed. amphipods A group of small, common, shrimplike crustaceans, flattened from side to side, which live mainly on the sea floor and feed on detritus (dead material). anadromous Of fish: living most of their lives at sea but entering rivers to breed, for example, the salmon. See also catadromous. anaerobic Relating to processes occurring without oxygen, or to organisms that are able to live in the absence of oxygen. See also anoxic. anemones Solitary cnidarians that live attached to surfaces and grab passing prey with their stinging tentacles. See also cnidarians, coral, polyp. annelids see segmented worms. anoxic Of a habitat: without available oxygen for living creatures. Antarctic Circle Line of latitude in the Southern Hemisphere south of which there is at least one day of 24-hour sunshine and at least one day of 24-hour darkness per year. anticyclone A pattern of circulating air in the atmosphere with high pressure in the center; usually associated with settled weather. See also cyclone. archaea A group of tiny, single-celled organisms. Like bacteria, they have no cell nucleus, but are classified
separately. They often live in extreme environments, such as deep-sea vents. See also bacteria. Arctic Circle Line of latitude in the Northern Hemisphere north of which there is at least one day of 24-hour sunshine and at least one day of 24-hour darkness per year. arthropods A major group (phylum) of invertebrate animals with jointed legs and a hard outer skeleton. It includes crustaceans (crabs, shrimp, and relatives), insects, spiders. See also crustaceans, exoskeleton. asexual reproduction Reproduction that does not involve combining the genes from two individuals (sex). It can consist of splitting or fragmenting the body, the budding of new individuals, or specialized structures forming, such as spores. atoll A low, ring-shaped island, or series of arc-shaped islands, forming the rim of a shallow lagoon. The structure results from an accumulation of coral on top of a sunken volcano. See also lagoon. authigenic Of sediments: formed locally in the ocean (especially via chemical processes), not transported from elsewhere. See also sediment. autotroph An organism, such as a plant, that can make its own food, rather than eating or absorbing food produced by other organisms. See also photosynthesis, primary producer.
B backshore Part of the shore above the average high-water mark, affected by the sea only during the highest tides and storms. See also foreshore. backwash The flow of water back to the sea after a wave has broken on a beach. bacteria Microscopic single-celled organisms abundant in all ecosystems. Their cells are much smaller than those of animals and plants and have no nucleus. See also archaea, cyanobacteria, protists. baleen Horny plates in the mouths of some whales that are used to strain food, such as krill, from the water. bank A shallow region of sea surrounded by deeper water. Often the site of productive fisheries. bar A long, narrow, offshore deposit of sediment lying parallel to a coastline. Bars may be permanently submerged, or exposed at low tide. A bar that is always exposed is a barrier island. A bar across the mouth of a bay and attached to the coast is a baymouth bar. See also barrier island, spit.
barbel Sensitive fleshy projections often found in pairs around the mouths of some fish. barnacles Specialized crustaceans whose adults live attached to rocks and other surfaces. They are protected by hard shell-like plates and filterfeed using highly modified limbs. See also crustaceans, filter feeding. barrage Human construction built across an estuary or inlet to protect against flooding by heavy seas. barrier island A permanently exposed bar of sand or pebbles lying parallel to a coastline. A barrier beach is a similar structure, but can be attached to the mainland at one or both ends. barrier reef A coral reef parallel to, but some distance from, a shoreline. basalt A common volcanic rock; originally solidified lava. The rock of the ocean floor is mainly basalt that has spread from mid-ocean ridges. basin see ocean basin. bathyal Relating to ocean depths between about 660 and 6,500 ft (200 and 2,000 m). The bathyal zone is the region of seabed and water column between these depths. See also abyssal. beach face The steeply sloping part of a beach, below a berm. See also berm. benthos Living organisms that live on or in the seabed (benthic organisms). berm A ridge of sediment high on a beach, left behind by a high tide. Also called a beach ridge. biodiversity The diversity or variety of living organisms; determined by, for instance, the number of species, or the variation within species. biogenic Formed by the action of living organisms. bioluminescence The production of light by living organisms. biomass The total mass or weight of living organisms in a given area. biome Any large-scale association of plants and animals, especially one dependent on particular climatic conditions. Mangrove swamp and the abyssal plain are marine biomes. bioturbation Disturbance and mixing of seafloor sediments, usually by burrowing animals. bivalves Mollusks, such as clams, mussels, and oysters, that have a shell made up of two hinged halves. Most bivalves move slowly or not at all, and are filter feeders. See also filter feeding, mollusks. black smoker A hydrothermal vent in which the emerging hot water is colored black with dark minerals. bloom A rapid growth of plankton, often turning the water cloudy and
greenish; usually a response to an increase in the availability of nutrients in the water. See also phytoplankton. blue-green algae see cyanobacteria. bony fishes The large group that includes all fish species except jawless fishes, sharks, and other cartilaginous fishes. See also cartilaginous fishes. bore see tidal bore. brackish Saltier than fresh water, but less salty than typical ocean water. breaker zone The zone of a beach, or other shoreline, where waves break. breakwater An artificial barrier built in the sea, usually near a harbor, to protect against waves and heavy seas. brittlestars Echinoderms with narrow, jointed, flexible arms; related to starfish. See also see echinoderms, starfish bryozoans Filter-feeding colonial animals that live attached to surfaces, such as seaweed fronds, either as flat sheets or as tufty, plantlike growths. Sometimes called “moss animals.” bycatch In fishing, the portion of a catch made up of non-target species.
C calcareous Consisting of or containing calcium carbonate. calcium carbonate The chemical CaCO3. It is the main constituent of coral skeletons and mollusk shells, limestone, and chalk. calve To shed icebergs into the sea. See also icebergs. carapace The upper shell of a turtle; the protective outer covering of some other animals, such as crabs. carbon cycle The cycling of carbon through the environment. During the cycle, carbon exists in the bodies of living things, in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and oceans, in fossil fuels, and in rocks such as limestone. cartilaginous fishes Fish, such as sharks, rays, skates, and chimaeras, whose skeleton is of cartilage, not bone. See also bony fishes. catadromous Of fish: living most of their lives in fresh water but migrating to the sea to breed. Eels are an example. See also anadromous. cephalopods A group of swimming mollusks that includes squid, cuttlefish, octopuses, and nautiluses. They have large brains and demonstrate complex behavior. See also mollusks. chemosynthesis A process in which some organisms make their own food using the energy from naturally occurring chemicals such as hydrogen sulfide. See also photosynthesis, autotroph, primary producer.
glossary chlorophyll The green pigment of plants and seaweeds that allows them to make their own food by using the Sun’s energy. See photosynthesis. chromatophore A skin cell in which the distribution of colored pigment can be altered, allowing an animal to change color. Color change may be fast, as in cephalopods, or slower, as in crustaceans and some fish. cilia Tiny beating hairlike structures on the surfaces of some cells. Used to aid movement in small organisms, or to create water currents. Singular cilium. cloaca The combined opening of the digestive, urinary, and reproductive systems of many vertebrates (e.g., fish, birds) and some invertebrates. cnidarians A major group (phylum) of invertebrate animals with simple bodies bearing tentacles that surround a single opening (mouth). Cnidarians include corals, anemones, and jellyfish, and are often colonial. Their two typical body forms are the polyp and the medusa. In some cnidarians, both forms occur during the life cycle. See also colonial, coral, medusa, nematocyst, polyp. coast See concordant coast, depositional coast, discordant coast, drowned coast, emergent coast, erosional coast, primary coast, secondary coast. cold seep A natural seepage of oil or other energy-containing chemicals on the sea floor, often supporting dense concentrations of marine life. colonial Of an animal: living in colonies. A colony can consist of separate individuals, as in the case of sponge shrimp, or animals joined by strands of living tissue, as in the case of many marine invertebrates, such as corals and bryozoans. Individuals may be specialized for different roles, such as feeding, reproduction, and defense, in which case the colony may behave like a single animal. See also bryozoans, cnidarians, zooid. comb jellies see ctenophores. commensal Living in close association with an organism of another species, for example, by sharing its burrow, without either helping or damaging it. See also mutualism, symbiosis. concordant coast Coast on which hills and valleys are roughly parallel to the shore, resulting either in a straight coastline or one with rocky islands running parallel to the shoreline. See also discordant coast. continental crust The material in Earth’s crust that forms the continents, including the continental margins. It is lighter and thicker than oceanic crust. continental margin A continent’s edge below sea level, including the continental shelf and continental slope. continental rise The gently sloping seabed around the edge of ocean basins that adjoins the bottom of the continental slope.
continental shelf The gently sloping seabed around the edges of most continents, formed of continental crust and averaging around 425 ft (130 m) deep. continental slope Sloping seabed at the seaward edge of the continental shelf. It descends relatively steeply to the continental rise. convection Circulating currents in a fluid—for example air, water, or hot rock—that result from heated portions rising because they are less dense, and sinking later as they cool. copepods Small, swimming crustaceans, usually less than 1/16 in (2 mm) long, that make up a large part of the zooplankton. There are also many parasitic and burrowing species. See also zooplankton. coral Any of various cnidarians that live fixed to the ocean bottom, secrete skeletons for support, and are usually colonial. The true corals lay down hard skeletons of calcium carbonate outside their bodies that eventually form coral reefs. Other coral groups include the sea fans. See also cnidarians, sea fans, zooxanthellae. coral bleaching Phenomenon in which coral animals lose their tiny symbiotic algae (zooxanthellae), usually in response to a stress in the environment. Bleached corals may later die. See also zooxanthellae. coral reef A rocklike, often ridgeshaped structure of calcium carbonate built in shallow tropical seas by generations of coral animals. See also barrier reef, fringing reef. coralline Resembling coral; mainly applied to red seaweeds that form hard, calcareous crusts on rocks or in coral reefs. Coriolis effect Phenomenon resulting from the rotation of Earth, in which winds and currents traveling toward or away from the equator are deflected to the right in the Northern Hemisphere and to the left in the Southern Hemisphere. The effect helps to explain the direction of prevailing winds and the existence of gyres. crabs see crustaceans. crinoids Stalked echinoderms, also called sea lilies, that filter-feed using their branching arms. Some species have no stalks and are known as feather stars. See also echinoderms. crustaceans The most diverse and abundant group of arthropods in the oceans. It includes crabs, lobsters, shrimps, barnacles, krill, copepods, isopods, and amphipods. Their jointed appendages are variously modified as claws, legs, swimming organs, or filter-feeding devices, depending on the species. See also arthropod. ctenophores Transparent jellyfish-like animals that hunt in the plankton. They swim using beating hairlike structures arranged in rows called comb plates. Also called comb jellies.
current Any sustained horizontal flow of water. See also drift, surface current, thermohaline circulation, turbidity current, western boundary current. cusp Any shape formed by two concave lines meeting at a point. Cusp-shaped ridges of sand are often created on beaches by wave action. cyanobacteria A group of minute, single-celled organisms, which can photosynthesize like plants. They are classified as bacteria, because they have a similar structure. Also called blue-green algae, although they are not closely related to other algae. See also photosynthesis. cyclone (1) Also called a depression, a pattern of circulating air in the atmosphere with low pressure at the center. Cyclones normally form over oceans outside the tropics and are associated with wet and windy weather. (2) See tropical cyclone.
D dark zone Vertical zone of the seabed and water column at around 3,300– 13,000 ft (1,000–4,000 m), between the twilight zone and abyssal zone. Virtually no light penetrates this deep. See also abyssal, twilight zone. delta An often fan-shaped structure of sediment built by the deposition of material by a river at its mouth. demersal Of a fish: living mainly near the sea floor. deposit feeding Feeding by extracting food particles from mud or other deposits. See also filter feeding. depositional coast A coast that is growing seaward due to deposition of sand and other sediment supplied by rivers or ocean currents. See also emergent coast, erosional coast. detritus Fragments of dead organisms and organic waste material, often mixed with sediment or suspended in ocean currents. A detritivore is an animal that feeds on detritus. diatoms A group of plantlike protists that are part of the algae and major primary producers in the plankton. They are single-celled but often grow as chains or colonies. Diatoms secrete intricate cases of silica around themselves. See also algae, primary producer, protists. dimorphism see sexual dimorphism. dinoflagellates A group of protists that bear two flagella. They are common in ocean plankton. Some are animal-like (eating other organisms), while others are plantlike (photosynthesizing) and are therefore part of the alga. See also algae, flagellum, protists. discordant coast Coast on which hills and valleys are roughly at right angles to the shore, resulting in an indented coastline of headlands and bays. See also concordant coast. doldrums The region of very light winds close to the equator.
dorsal Relating to the back or upper surface of an animal. See also ventral. drift A broad, slow-moving flow of surface water; for example, the North Atlantic Drift. drowned coast A coast where the land has sunk or the sea level has risen compared with the previous level. It may show features such as rias or fjords. See also emergent coast, fjord, ria. dune A hill or ridge-shaped structure of sand formed by wind action along some coasts and in deserts. Coastal dunes are usually formed on low-lying land behind beaches.
E echinoderms A major group (phylum) of marine invertebrates that includes starfish, brittle stars, sea urchins, sea lilies, sea cucumbers, and sea daisies. Echinoderms have bodies arranged in parts rather like the spokes of a wheel (so-called “radial symmetry”). They have chalky protective plates under their skin, and use a unique system of hydraulic “tube feet” for moving, or for capturing prey, or both. echolocation Method of locating and characterizing nearby objects, used by dolphins, bats, and some other animals, by emitting high-pitched sounds and interpreting their echoes. echo-sounding The use of sound equipment to measure the depth of objects or the ocean floor; also used as a synonym for echolocation. See also sonar. eddy A circular motion of any size and speed in a fluid. Mesoscale eddies of more than 60 miles (100 km) across are important features of ocean circulation. In tidal currents and whirlpools, an eddy is a circular motion slower than a whirlpool. See also gyre, vortex, whirlpool. Ekman effect Tendency for a wind or current to cause air or water above or below it to move, but in a different direction to the original wind or current. The effect results from the rotation of Earth. At the ocean surface, the net result is usually that a prevailing wind creates a water current at 90° to the wind direction. See also Coriolis force. El Niño Phenomenon by which the waters of the eastern Pacific off South America become warmer than usual every 4–7 years. The opposite phenomenon, in which eastern Pacific waters are unusually cold, is called La Niña. The term El Niño is also used as shorthand for the larger phenomenon called the El Niño– Southern Oscillation. See ENSO. emergent coast A coast where the land has risen or sea level has fallen compared with a former level. See also drowned coast, isostasy. ENSO Used as an abbreviation for the El Niño–Southern Oscillation.
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glossary A worldwide variation in Earth’s climate pattern and ocean circulation, including the El Niño phenomenon, associated with a change in the position of warm surface waters in the eastern Pacific. erosional coast A coast that is being eroded by the action of the sea. Rocky coasts are typically erosional, but so are some low-lying, sandy coasts. See also depositional coast. estuary The mouth of a large river. Used more broadly, the term includes any bay or inlet where sea water becomes diluted with fresh water. eustatic Of sea-level changes: occurring worldwide simultaneously, for example, as a result of melting ice sheets. See also isostasy. eutrophication The altering of an aquatic ecosystem by the addition of plant nutrients, such as nitrate and phosphate. Often caused by humans, it can greatly change the character of an ecosystem by, for example, causing algal blooms. See also bloom. exoskeleton A skeleton on the outside of an animal’s body, often also acting as a protective barrier. Arthropods, such as crustaceans and insects, have an exoskeleton. See also arthropods.
F fast ice Sea ice forming a continuous sheet. See also sea ice, pack ice. fathom The traditional unit of depth measurement at sea, equivalent to 6 ft (1.83 m). fault A fracture in Earth’s crust where rocks have moved relative to one another either vertically or horizontally. feather stars see crinoids. Ferrel cell A large-scale circulation of air in temperate regions, involving air rising at around 60°N and S, flowing southward at a high altitude, descending at around 30°N or S, and returning north as the westerlies (westerly winds). See also Hadley cell. fertilization The union of a male and female sex cell (such as a sperm and an egg cell in animals) as the first step in the production of a new organism by sexual reproduction. Some marine animals release eggs and sperm into the sea to meet by chance (external fertilization), while in others, the male transfers sperm directly into the female’s body (internal fertilization). fetch The distance of open ocean across which a wind is able to blow, and across which waves generated by the wind are traveling. A longer fetch tends to result in larger swell waves. See also swell wave. filter feeding Feeding by collecting and separating food particles from the environment. When the food particles are suspended in water it is also called suspension feeding. See also deposit feeding.
fjord A narrow, steep-sided, deep inlet of the sea, once occupied by a glacier. Fjords have a shallower sill where they meet the open sea. See also ria. flagellum A flexible, microscopic, hairlike structure used for propulsion by some single-celled organisms and for creating a water current by sponges. It is longer than a cilium. Plural flagella. See also cilia, sponges. flatworms A major group (phylum) of invertebrates with simple, usually flattened bodies. Free-living forms are carnivorous; there are also many parasitic species, including tapeworms. fluke Either of the lobes forming a whale’s, dolphin’s, or dugong’s tail. foraminiferans A group of protists whose empty, chalky skeletons are a major part of some deep-sea sediments. They are animal-like (they feed on other organisms) and include both planktonic and bottom-living types. See also protists. forced wave A water wave created by storm winds at sea. Forced waves are taller and have a shorter wavelength than swell waves. See also swell wave. foreshore The part of a shoreline that lies between the average high- and low-water marks. See also tides. frazil ice Ice in the form of tiny crystals floating on or near the sea surface. It is the first stage in the formation of sea ice. See sea ice. fringing reef A coral reef just offshore, without an intervening lagoon or stretch of water. See also barrier reef. front A vertical or oblique region at the boundary of two masses of air or water with different characteristics.
G gabion A wire cage filled with stones. Gabions are used to protect coastlines artificially against erosion. gastropods The group of mollusks that includes snails, slugs, and pteropods (sea-butterflies). See also mollusks. gill rakers Projections on the insides of the gill supports of some fish that sieve particles entering their mouths. glacier An elongated mass of compressed ice that flows slowly downhill. Glaciers that reach the sea give rise to icebergs. grease ice Stage of formation of sea ice in which frazil ice crystals congeal to form a soupy texture. See also frazil ice, sea ice. greenhouse gas A gas, such as water vapor, carbon dioxide, or methane, that prevents heat from radiating from Earth, causing Earth’s surface to warm (the greenhouse effect). Some greenhouse gas emissions are natural; others are caused by human activities. groyne An artificial barrier built down a beach and into the sea to hinder
transport of materials by longshore drift. See also longshore drift. guyot A flat-topped submarine mountain, also called a tablemount. See also seamount. gyre A large-scale circulation of surface ocean currents, typically spanning a whole ocean. See also eddy.
H hadal Relating to the deepest oceanic regions below 20,000 ft (6,000 m), within ocean trenches; deeper than the abyssal zone. See also abyssal. Hadley cell A large-scale circulation of air in warmer regions, caused by warmed air rising near the equator, traveling to mid-latitudes, cooling and descending, and returning to the equator as the trade winds. halocline A boundary between waters of different salinities, across which salinity changes rapidly. See also pycnocline, thermocline. headland A promontory on a shoreline, usually high and rocky and under strong forces of coastal erosion. See also erosional coast. heat capacity The amount of heat energy that a given substance can absorb for a given rise in temperature. Water has a high heat capacity and so can act as a store of heat. hermaphrodite An animal that is both male and female. Animals that are both sexes at once are called simultaneous hermaphrodites. Others start as males then become females, or vice versa. Some species change sex repeatedly. holdfast A rootlike structure that anchors a seaweed to rocks but does not absorb nutrients like a true root. holoplankton Planktonic organisms that spend all of their life as plankton. See also meroplankton, plankton. holothurians Soft-bodied, sausageshaped echinoderms, also called sea cucumbers, that feed mainly by swallowing mud and detritus. Their radial symmetry is not obvious at first glance. See also echinoderms. hotspot A localized region of Earth that experiences large-scale upwelling of magma. As oceanic crust moves over a hotspot, a line of volcanic islands, such as the Hawaiian islands, may form over millions of years. hurricane (1) A name for a tropical cyclone, especially one occurring in the Atlantic. See tropical cyclone. (2) A wind speed greater than 72 mph (116 km/h). hydrocarbon Any chemical compound made only of carbon and hydrogen atoms. hydroids Cnidarians that grow as small, branching colonies of polyps attached to rocks or seaweed. Each polyp is specialized either for feeding,
reproduction, or sometimes for defense. See also cnidarians, polyp. hydrothermal vent A fissure in a volcanically active region of the ocean floor from which superheated, chemical-laden water emerges. The energy in the chemicals fuels rich biological communities via the activities of chemosynthetic bacteria and archaea. See also chemosynthesis.
I ice age Any episode in which Earth’s temperatures were much lower than today and ice cover more extensive. The Ice Age (with capitals) refers to a series of such episodes within the last 2 million years, the last ending around 10,000 years ago. iceberg A large fragment of ice calved from the end of a glacier or ice sheet that is in contact with the sea. See also calve. ice cap A mass of permanent ice similar to an ice sheet but smaller in extent. ice lead A channel of open water among sea ice. ice rafting Transport of rocky debris out to sea, frozen into icebergs. When the icebergs melt, the material is deposited as sediment. ice sheet A very large mass of permanent ice covering land, such as the Antarctic Ice Sheet. ice shelf An extension of an ice sheet into the ocean. Ice shelves are anchored to the sea floor at their landward end, but farther from the coast, they float on water. igneous rock Any rock that originates from the cooling of magma, such as basalt or granite. intermediate coast A coast whose features are intermediate between a primary and secondary coast. See also primary coast, secondary coast. internal wave A wave occurring at the boundary of two different layers of the same fluid rather than at the surface—for example, at the boundary between two layers of ocean water. intertropical convergence zone The region of air close to the equator where the north and south trade winds converge. invertebrate Any animal without a backbone, ranging from flatworms to spiders. Of a total of around 30 major groups (phyla) of animals, 29 are composed of invertebrates. irradiance The amount of radiation falling on a given area. island arc Chain of islands, usually including active volcanoes, created by the collision of the oceanic crust of two tectonic plates. One of the plates is subducted beneath the other, creating a trench on one side of the arc. See also subduction, ocean trench. isopods A group of crustaceans that usually have flattened bodies. The
glossary group is mainly marine but also includes the land-living woodlice. isostasy A state of equilibrium; applied especially to the relatively light rocks of the continental crust, which can be thought of as floating like icebergs among the heavier rocks of the ocean floor and mantle. Isostatic rebound is the tendency of land that was formerly ice-covered to rise slowly to its equilibrium level, often creating emergent coasts. See also continental crust, emergent coast. IUCN The initials still used to designate the World Conservation Union (formerly the International Union for the Conservation of Nature). This organization carries out conservationrelated activities, including gathering and publishing information on the current status of endangered species.
J jawless fishes Two groups of primitive fish called lampreys and hagfish, which branched off the line of fish evolution before jaws had evolved. jellyfish Cnidarians that typically drift among the plankton and catch prey using stinging tentacles. The body form of true jellyfish is a medusa. Some apparently similar forms such as the Portuguese man-of-war are not true jellyfish, but siphonophores. See also cnidarians, medusa, siphonophores.
K katabatic wind A wind that blows downward from an ice sheet, glacier, or cold valley, usually at night. krill Swimming, shrimplike crustaceans typically growing to ¾–22/3 in (2–6 cm) long, which form a large part of the zooplankton and an important link in the Southern Ocean’s food chain.
L La Niña see El Niño. lagoon A stretch of coastal water almost cut off from the sea by a spit or other barrier; also, the shallow water within the ring of an atoll. larva A young stage of an animal, especially when completely different in structure from the adult. The larvae of many marine animals, such as starfish, live as part of the plankton. See also metamorphosis. latent heat The heat absorbed or released when a substance changes its state—from gas to liquid, for example. The heat released when water vapor condenses is the main source of energy for hurricanes. latitude A position on Earth expressed in terms of its angle north or south of the plane of the equator. Low latitudes are those close to the
equator, while high latitudes are nearer the poles. levee A natural raised bank around some rivers, or an artificial bank built around a river or estuary. littoral Relating to the area of shore between high- and low-water marks. longitude A position on Earth expressed in terms of its angle east or west of an agreed line called the prime meridian circling Earth from pole to pole and passing through Greenwich, London, UK. longshore drift Process by which sediment is transported along a coast as a result of waves breaking at an oblique angle to the shoreline.
M magma Molten rock rising from deep inside Earth. mangrove Any of various trees growing on muddy shores in the tropics and adapted to live with their roots and lower trunks immersed in salt water. mangrove swamp Forestlike ecosystem formed by mangroves growing in muddy tidal areas and river mouths. Mangrove swamps only occur in the tropics and subtropics. mantle All the rock lying between Earth’s crust and its core. The mantle extends to a depth of about 1,800 miles (2,900 km). medusa One of the two main body forms of cnidarians. Medusae are wide and saucer-shaped, as well as usually free-floating and able to swim. A jellyfish is an example of a medusa. See also cnidarians, polyp. meroplankton Planktonic animals that are the larvae of animals that are not planktonic as adults, such as crabs. metamorphosis The process of transforming body form from that of the young (larval) form to a radically different adult form. It is common in marine invertebrates such as starfish, whose larvae live in the plankton but whose adults live on the sea floor. mid-ocean ridge A submerged range of mountains running along any part of the deep-ocean floor, marking the place where seafloor spreading is taking place. Also called a spreading ridge. See also seafloor spreading. mimicry Phenomenon in which one species of animal has evolved to look similar to another, unrelated animal. mixed layer The upper layer of the ocean that is kept mixed by winds and currents, so that its temperature and chemical characteristics are roughly uniform throughout. mollusks A major group (phylum) of invertebrate animals that includes the gastropods (snails and slugs), bivalves (clams and relatives), and cephalopods (octopuses, squid, cuttlefish, and nautiluses). Mollusks are soft-bodied and typically have hard shells, though
some subgroups have lost the shell during their evolution. mucus A sticky or slimy substance secreted by animals for protection, trapping prey, helping with movement, or other purposes. mutualism A close relationship between two different species in which both benefit.
N nanoplankton Planktonic organisms of 0.002–0.2 mm in diameter. Not as small as picoplankton. See also picoplankton, plankton. neap tide The tide with the smallest range within an approximately twoweek cycle, caused by the gravity of the Sun partly canceling out the effect of the Moon. See also spring tide, tides. nearshore The part of the shore affected by waves and tides under normal conditions. It includes the foreshore plus an area beyond whose bed is shallow enough to be stirred up by wave action. See also foreshore. nekton Animals of the open ocean that can swim strongly enough not to be at the mercy of ocean currents. Nekton include squid, adult fish, and marine mammals. See also plankton. nematocyst The coiled structure within the stinging cell of a jellyfish or other cnidarian that shoots out and injects toxin via a dartlike tip. See also cnidarians. nudibranchs see sea slugs.
O ocean basin A region of low-lying oceanic crust within which a deep ocean (or part of one) is contained, and usually surrounded by land or shallower seas. oceanic crust The type of Earth’s crust that forms the deep ocean bed. Made mainly of basalt, it is thinner, denser, and heavier than continental crust. ocean trench Elongated low-lying region of the ocean floor. Trenches are the deepest parts of the ocean. See also subduction. ooze Sediment on the deep ocean floor containing a large proportion of the remains of the skeletons of planktonic organisms, such as foraminiferans or radiolarians. overfall A stretch of rough water produced when a tidal current flows in the opposite direction to the wind. ovoviviparous Producing live young by retaining eggs so that they hatch while still in the female’s body.
P pack ice A mosaic of floating ice formed when continuous sea ice
is broken up by storms or waves. See also fast ice, sea ice. pancake ice Stage of formation of sea ice consisting of small flat areas of ice, curled at the edges where they bump into each other. pectoral fin Either of the front pair of fins in most fish and marine mammals, mainly used for steering but sometimes for propulsion. See also pelvic fin. pelagic Relating to or living in the waters of the open ocean, without immediate contact with the shore or the sea bottom. See also demersal. pelvic fin Either of the pair of fins located further back than the pectoral fins in most fish. See also pectoral fin. perennial Of plants: living for three or more years. pheromone An odor produced by an animal to communicate with others of the same species, to attract the opposite sex, for example. photic zone see sunlit zone. photophore A light-producing organ. photosynthesis Process in green plants, algae, and cyanobacteria whereby the Sun’s energy is used to build energy-containing food molecules from carbon dioxide and water. See also chemosynthesis, chlorophyll. phylum The highest-level grouping in the classification of the animal kingdom. Each phylum has a unique basic body plan. Mollusks, arthropods, and echinoderms are examples. phytoplankton Planktonic organisms, such as microscopic algae and cyanobacteria, which produce their own food by photosynthesis. picoplankton The smallest planktonic organisms, typically bacteria, of 0.0002–0.002 mm in diameter. See also nanoplankton. plankton Marine or freshwater organisms, living in open water, that cannot swim strongly and so drift with the currents. Although small life forms dominate, larger creatures, such as jellyfish, are also planktonic. See also nanoplankton, nekton, phytoplankton, zooplankton. plate boundary A border between two tectonic plates. The plates may be converging (destructive boundary), diverging (constructive boundary), or sliding past (conservative or strike-slip boundary). See also transform fault. plate, tectonic see tectonic plate. plate tectonics Phenomena linked to the relative movement of Earth’s tectonic plates, including continental drift, seafloor spreading, earthquakes, and mountain-building; also, the theory explaining these occurrences. polychaetes A large subgroup of segmented worms common in the oceans, often with bristles down the sides of the body. (Polychaete means “many bristles”). Some species can move around, while others anchor themselves within tubes or burrows
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glossary and filter-feed. See also segmented worm, tube worm. polynya An area of open water in an otherwise ice-covered sea, especially in the Arctic. polyp One of the two main bodyforms of cnidarians. An anemone or coral animal is a polyp. Polyps are typically tubular and attached to a surface at their base. See also cnidarians, medusa. prevailing wind A wind that tends to blow from a particular direction. See trade winds, westerlies. primary coast A coast whose features have not been significantly altered by marine erosion, the activity of animals such as corals, or human intervention. See also secondary coast. primary producer Often called simply a producer, an organism that makes food, using energy either from the Sun or from naturally occurring inorganic chemicals. See also autotroph, chemosynthesis, photosynthesis. productivity Rate at which living material is produced by organisms by growth and reproduction. See also primary producer. prokaryotes Organisms such as bacteria and archaea, whose cells are smaller and simpler in structure than the cells of animals, plants, and protists. Cells of prokaryotes have no nucleus. See also archaea, bacteria. protein A large molecule built by organisms from smaller molecules called amino acids. Proteins range from the enzymes that promote chemical reactions in body cells, to structural materials such as keratin— the tough protein that makes up hair, horn, and nails. protists A wide grouping of often unrelated, microscopic organisms, traditionally classified as a single kingdom. It includes mostly singlecelled forms, either animal-like (formerly called protozoa) or plantlike (many of which are termed algae). Some experts also include larger algae (seaweeds). Protist cells contain nuclei, like the cells of animals and plants, but unlike those of bacteria. pteropods Swimming, planktonic gastropod mollusks, also called sea butterflies. The crawling foot of their snail-like ancestors has evolved into muscular “wings” that propel them along. See also gastropod, plankton. pycnocline A boundary region in ocean waters within which density changes rapidly. It typically results from a combination of temperature and salinity levels, both of which affect density. See also thermocline.
R radiation The emission of high-energy particles or waves. Electromagnetic radiation consists of electromagnetic waves: listed from long-wave to
short-wave forms, these are radio waves, microwaves, infrared (heat) rays, visible light, ultraviolet light, X-rays, and gamma rays. Shortwavelength electromagnetic radiation has the highest energy. radiolarians Single-celled predatory organisms mainly living as plankton, often with a delicate, perforated, spherical skeleton. Radiolarian remains of are an important part of some oceanic sediments. reclamation The artificial conversion of a former coastal sea or wetland area into dry land. reef see coral reef. refraction The change of direction of a wave when it passes into a different medium—for example, light waves passing from air into water. Ocean waves are also refracted when they reach shallow water. respiration (1) Breathing. (2) Also called cellular respiration, the biochemical processes within cells that break down food molecules, usually by combining them with oxygen, to provide energy for an organism. See also anaerobic. revetment A sloping structure of spaced wooden or concrete beams, constructed to protect a beach or low cliff against erosion. ria A winding inlet of the sea, a drowned former river valley. Most present-day rias were created when sea levels rose at the end of the last ice age. Unlike a fjord, a ria was never occupied by a glacier. ribbon worms A major group (phylum) of narrow-bodied, unsegmented marine worms, also called proboscis worms, some of which can reach 160 ft (50 m) in length. rip current A current flowing away from a shoreline, carrying water that has been pushed shoreward by waves. See also tide rip. rip-rap Boulders piled deliberately on a shoreline to prevent erosion.
S salinity Degree of saltiness. salps Barrel-shaped, delicate-bodied tunicates that live as filter-feeders in the plankton. See also tunicates. salt marsh An ecosystem developing on sheltered, flat, muddy coastlines, where tidal flats are colonized by salttolerant land plants. See also tidal flat. sand dune see dune. scute Any of the horny plates that form the outer covering of the shells of turtles; also used to described a similar protective structure on some fish and other animals. sea arch A natural arch on a rocky shoreline, usually created by two sea caves on either side of a headland eroding into each other. sea butterflies see pteropods.
sea cave A cave created at the foot of a cliff by wave action. sea cucumbers see holothurians. sea fans Fan-shaped corals belonging to the gorgonian or horny coral group. Though often growing on coral reefs, they are not reef formers themselves. See also coral. sea pens A group of soft-bodied, colonial cnidarians. Each colony resembles a single individual, with one large, burrowing polyp anchoring the colony in seafloor mud, and smaller polyps feeding and reproducing. See also cnidarians, polyps. sea slugs Shell-less marine gastropods, often with bright colors and tufty gills (ctenidia) on their backs. Sea slugs are carnivores and are not closely related to land slugs. Also called nudibranchs. See also gastropods. sea stack An isolated pillar of rock left standing offshore on a rocky coastline after all the surrounding land has been eroded away. sea urchins A group of echinoderms, usually with a rigid case called a test, a globular body, long spines, and a downward-facing mouth. Most graze algae from hard surfaces, though the heart urchins and sand dollars are burrowers. See also echinoderms. seafloor spreading The creation of new oceanic crust by the upwelling of magma at mid-ocean ridges and consequent spreading of the sea floor on either side. See also plate tectonics. seagrasses Any of various plants able to grow and root in shallow, sandy seabed along coastlines, especially in warmer seas. Although not actually grasses, they are true flowering plants, unlike seaweeds, which are algae. sea ice Ice that forms on the surface of the sea, as distinct from ice shelves and icebergs, which originate on land. Some sea ice forms only in winter, while other sea ice is semipermanent. Sea ice forms and evolves in several stages. See frazil ice, grease ice, pack ice, pancake ice. seamount A submarine mountain, usually an extinct volcano. sea spiders A group of eight-legged predatory marine arthropods. It is not agreed whether sea spiders are closely related to land spiders or not. sea squirts see tunicates. seaweed A member of any of three main groups of large-bodied algae. Seaweeds can make their own food by photosynthesis, but they lack roots. Their classification is not agreed, but green seaweeds seem to be related to plants, while red and brown seaweeds may represent two unrelated lines of evolution. See also algae. secondary coast A coast with features significantly altered by marine erosion, the activity of animals such as corals, human intervention, or all three. See also primary coast. sedentary Of animals such as worms:
habitually staying in one position. See also sessile. sediment An accumulation of solid particles that have settled out from water; also used for deposits left by other agencies such as the wind. sedimentary rock Any rock originating from sediment that has later become compacted and hardened, such as sandstone. segmented worms A major group (phylum) of worms, also called annelids, whose body is built from repeating units (segments) each bearing copies of organs, such as kidneys. The phylum includes earthworms, plus many marine species, mostly within a subgroup called the polychaetes. See also phylum, polychaetes, worm. sessile Of an animal: attached permanently to a surface, especially without a stalk, and not able to move around. See also sedentary. sexual dimorphism Situation in which the males and females of a species differ in appearance, for example, in color, shape, or size. shrimp Any of various small, usually swimming crustaceans. True shrimps are relatives of crabs and lobsters. siphon In mollusks: a fleshy tubular extension of the body that aids the flow of oxygenated seawater to the gills or sometimes transports food particles for filtering. Cephalopods use their siphons for jet propulsion. See also cephalopods. siphonophores Floating, predatory, colonial cnidarians, such as the Portuguese man-of-war. The colony members have specialized functions but act together so that the colony functions like a single animal. See also cnidarians, colonial, polyp, zooid. sonar A method of echo-sounding; often used more broadly as a synonym for echolocation. See also echolocation, echo-sounding. Southern Oscillation see ENSO. spit A peninsula of sand or shingle or both created by longshore drift, usually at a point where the shoreline changes direction. See also bar, barrier island, longshore drift, tombolo. sponges A large group (phylum) of marine animals with a very simple structure that feed by creating currents through their bodies and filtering small particles from the water. They have no muscles or nerve cells, and sometimes no symmetry. spore (1) A tiny structure produced (usually in large quantities) by nonflowering plants, fungi, and some protists, from which a new individual can grow. Spores are much smaller than seeds and usually produced asexually, sometimes forming part of a complex life history. (2) The inactive, resistant form of some bacteria that helps them survive unfavorable conditions. See also asexual reproduction.
glossary spreading ridge see mid-ocean ridge. spring tide The highest high tide and lowest low tide within an approximately two-week cycle, caused by the Sun and the Moon being in positions in which their gravitational effects add together most strongly. See also tides, neap tide. squid see cephalopod. stack see sea stack. standing wave A wave that stays in the same position rather than moving along, found in particular situations such as tidal races. starfish A group of echinoderms, also called sea stars, having five or more “arms” (extensions to the body) and both mouth and anus on the underside. They swallow their prey whole, which can be very large for their size. See also echinoderms. storm beach The topmost ridge of sediment on a beach, usually formed by the highest spring tides in combination with storm conditions. See also berm, spring tide. storm surge A rapid rise in sea level caused by storm winds driving water toward a shoreline. It can cause disastrous coastal flooding, especially if occurring at the same time as a high spring tide. subantarctic Relating to latitudes immediately north of the Antarctic Circle. subarctic Relating to latitudes immediately south of the Arctic Circle. subduction The forcing down of oceanic crust belonging to one tectonic plate beneath another plate when two plates are colliding. Ocean trenches are the location of such subduction zones. sublittoral Relating to the coastal marine environment below the low-water mark. submersible A vessel built to operate underwater. Some submersibles are designed to be able to withstand great pressures in order to explore the ocean depths. sunlit zone The topmost layer of ocean water, where enough light penetrates for photosynthesis to occur. Also called the photic zone, it extends from the surface to up to 660 ft (200 m). See also dark zone, twilight zone. surf zone The zone on a shore where waves break and create foaming, turbulent water. surface current Any current flowing at the surface of the ocean—for example, the Gulf Stream. Surface currents are mainly caused by friction from prevailing winds. See also current, thermohaline circulation. surface tension The attraction between water molecules at a water surface, which creates a thin film with the strength to resist small deflections, allowing some insects, for example, to walk on the water surface.
suspension feeding see filter feeding. swash The movement of turbulent water up a shore after a wave breaks. The swash zone is the zone of a shore where swash typically occurs. swell waves Regular, smoothly traveling waves on the open ocean, especially when at a distance from the winds or storms that originally caused them. See also fetch. swim bladder A gas-filled organ in many fish, used to control buoyancy, and sometimes for other purposes such as sound production. symbiosis A close living relationship between two species, especially one in which both benefit. See also mutualism, commensalism.
T tablemount see guyot. tabular Of an iceberg: very wide and flat-topped. tectonic plate Any of the large rigid sections into which Earth’s crust and uppermost mantle are divided, whose relative movement is the subject of plate tectonics. The African Plate and the Pacific Plate are examples. See plate tectonics. terrigenous Of marine sediments: originating on the land (for example, carried to the sea by rivers). thermocline A region at a particular depth in the ocean or height in the air where average temperature changes rapidly. See also pycnocline. thermohaline circulation The part of the ocean’s water circulation powered by differences in the salinity and temperature of different water masses, rather than by the wind. Thermohaline circulation is the cause of most deep-water and some surface currents. See also surface current. tidal bore A single large wave created when an incoming tide moves up a narrowing channel, such as an estuary. tidal bulge or trough see tides. tidal current see tides. tidal flat A flat, muddy area covered at high tide; characteristic of sheltered areas such as estuaries. tidal race A strong current created when a tide-generated water flow moves through a narrow channel. tide rip A stretch of turbulent water where different tidal currents meet. tides Fluctuation in sea level resulting from the gravitational attraction of the Sun and the Moon on Earth’s oceans, combined with Earth’s own rotation. In the open oceans, each tidal cycle of just over 12 hours generates a small but measurable vertical rise (tidal bulge) and fall (tidal trough) in the water. Tidal effects are much more obvious near the coast, and lead to horizontal water movements (tidal currents) as well as vertical movements.
tombolo A spit linking an island to the mainland or another island. See spit. trade winds Prevailing winds blowing from the east toward the equator in subtropical and tropical latitudes. transform fault A fault in which the rocks on either side are displaced horizontally. Numerous transform faults occur at right angles to midocean ridges. See also plate tectonics. trench see ocean trench. tropical Relating to the warm regions of Earth that lie between the equator and the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, at latitudes of 23.5° north and south, respectively. The term is sometimes used loosely for phenomena typical of these regions, even when occurring north or south of the two tropics. tropical cyclone A large-scale, circulating weather system in warmer latitudes, called by different names, such as hurricane and typhoon, in different parts of the world. It generates intense winds and torrential rain. Its energy comes from the water vapor rising from warm seas and then condensing. A less powerful version of the phenomenon is called a tropical storm. See also cyclone, hurricane, latent heat, typhoon. tsunami A sometimes huge water wave usually generated by displacement of water by an earthquake and capable of devastating shorelines thousands of miles from its origin. Sometimes inaccurately called a “tidal wave.” tube worms Worms that live anchored and protected in tubes, which are either secreted or built of material such as sand grains. Tube worms include the giant worms living around some hydrothermal vents, as well as many segmented worms. See also polychaetes. tunicates A group of mainly filterfeeding marine invertebrates closely related to backboned animals (vertebrates). There are both solitary and colonial species. They include non-moving attached forms (seasquirts) and others that drift in the plankton. See also salps. turbidity current A phenomenon similar to an underwater avalanche or landslide, involving water laden with sediments slipping down a slope. twilight zone The vertical zone of the water column and seabed lying between approximately 660 and 3,300 ft (200 and 1,000 m) deep, into which some light penetrates, but not enough to support photosynthesis. typhoon see tropical cyclone.
U upwelling The upward motion of deep-ocean water toward the surface. Some upwelling increases ocean fertility by recirculating nutrients from deeper layers.
V ventral Relating to the lower surface or belly of an animal. See also dorsal. vertical migration Behavior of many zooplankton, fish, and squid of the open ocean, in which they rise nearer the surface by night and sink deeper by day, probably to escape predators. vertical transport Any large-scale vertical flow of ocean water. vortex A fast-rotating eddy in a fluid; sometimes used as a synonym for whirlpool. See also eddy, whirlpool.
W water column The volume of water between the ocean surface and the bottom of the ocean. wave A motion or disturbance that transfers energy. The water in a wave crossing the open ocean does not move significantly except up and down as the wave passes. The high point of a wave is its crest and the low point its trough. Water motion becomes more complex and turbulent in waves breaking on shores (breakers). westerlies Prevailing winds that blow from the west. Westerlies are the most common winds in temperate regions. western boundary current A relatively narrow, fast-moving surface current formed at the western boundary of an ocean basin, usually as part of a gyre. The Gulf Stream is an example. Deep-water western boundary currents also exist. See also gyre. whirlpool A powerful eddy or vortex formed at the sea’s surface, often caused when two separate tidal currents meet. See also eddy, vortex. white smoker A deep-ocean hydrothermal vent in which the emerging hot water appears white because of light-colored mineral particles suspended in it. worm Any of a variety of usually nonswimming invertebrate animals that are long, slender and flexible, and lack legs and shells. See flatworms, ribbon worms, segmented worms, tube worms.
Z zoea The planktonic larval stage of certain crustaceans, including crabs. They are different in structure from their adult forms, having long spines. zooid An individual in a colony of interconnected animals, such as bryozoans. The term is not applied to colonial coral animals, which are termed polyps. See also polyp. zooplankton Any animals or animallike protists that are part of the plankton. See also plankton. zooxanthellae Symbiotic, microscopic algae living in the tissues of many corals. See also symbiosis.
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index
INDEX Page numbers in bold indicate feature profiles or extended treatments of a topic. Page numbers in italic indicate pages on which the topic is illustrated. Features shown on the maps in the Atlas of the Oceans are listed in a separate index on pp.505–509.
A Abalone, Red 286 Aberdeen Harbor, Hong Kong 99 Abudefduf saxatilis 364 abyssal plain 176, 177, 182 abyssal zone 168, 171, 219 Abyssobrotula galatheae 183 Acadia National Park 94 Acanthaster planci 311 Acanthephyra pelagica 298 acanthodians 227 accretion, cold 42 Acetabularia acetabulum 249 acidification, ocean 67 Acipenser sturio 342 Acoel Flatworm 273 Acorn Barnacle 296 Acorn Worm 315, 316 Acropora hyacinthus 270 Actinia equina 268 Adamsia carciniopados 269 Adelie Penguin 383 Adocia species 261 Adriatic Sea 120, 442 Aegean microplate 443 Aegean Sea 442, 443 Aegean Volcanic Arc 443 Aeoliscus strigatus 359 Aethia cristatella 403 Aethia pusilla 403 Aetobatus narinari 337 African Plate 427, 441, 442, 443, 446, 459 agar gel 244 Aghulas Current 450, 451, 459 Aglaeophenia cupressina 264 Ahinga 132 Aipysurus foliosquama 379 Aipysurus laevis 379 air sacs, seabirds 382 Alaska Current 461, 463 Alaskan Brown Bear 129 Alaskan mudflats 129 Albatross Black-browed 185, 201, 382, 391 Black-footed 390 Gray-headed 201 Light-mantled Sooty 390 Short-tailed 390 Wandering 391 albatrosses 384 albedo 48, 65 Albula vulpes 343 Alcock Rise 454 Alcyonidium diaphanum 307 Alcyonium digitatum 266 Aldabra Atoll 158 Aleutian Current 463 Aleutian Islands 462, 463 Aleutian Trench 462 algae blue-green 233 coraline 239 green 250 mudflats 125 symbiotic partnership 250 algal bloom, Chesapeake Bay 116 Algarve, Western, marine erosion 97 Algerian Basin 442 alginate extraction 151 All-Terrain Vehicles, effect on sand dunes 113
Allis Shad 346 Alosa alosa 346 Alpha Cordillera 428 Alpine Fault, New Zealand 480 Aluterus scriptus 370 Alvarado Mangroves Ecoregion 132 Alvin submersible 168, 171, 173, 182–83, 188 Alvinella pompejana 171, 277 Amalfi Coast, marine erosion 97 Amazon Estuary 118, 444 freshwater inflow 65 Amblyrynchus cristatus 380 Ambulocetus 228 American Crocodile 132, 133, 381 American Horseshoe Crab 295 Ammodytes tobianus 368 ammonites 228, 229 Ammophila arenaria 109, 113, 253 Amphibolis antarctica 150 Amphiprion ocellaris 364 amplitude, wave 76 ampullae of Lorenzini 325 Amundsen, Roald (1872–1928) 430, 485 Anarhichus lupus 365 Anatolian Plate 443 Anchoveta, Peruvian 346 Andaman Islands 454 Andaman Sea 454 coral reefs 159 Andes Mountains 479 andesite 45 Anemone Antarctic 269 Beadlet 268 Cloak 269 Giant 268 Jewel 143, 269 Kelp 147 Plumose 269 Tube 177, 272 Anemone Shrimp 12–13, 298 Anemonefish False Clown 364 Maldives 218 Angelfish, Queen 154, 363 Angelshark 325 angiosperms 146, 252 Angler 222, 353 Deep-sea 225, 352 Hairy 352 Humpback see Common Blackdevil Regan’s 353 Angola Basin 446 Anguilla anguilla 344 anhydrite, hydrothermal vents 188 animals 258–59 bottom-living see benthos classification 207–209 diversity 258 reproduction 259 Anjuna Beach 111 Anning, Mary (1799–1847) 228 Anoplogaster cornuta 355 Anous stolidus 401 Anseropoda placenta 310 Antarctic Anemone 269 Antarctic Circumpolar Current 195, 201, 432, 448, 460, 482 Antarctic Coastal Current 201 Antarctic Convergence 201 Antarctic Fur Seal 407 Antarctic Ice Sheet 48, 482 Antarctic ice shelves 192–93 Antarctic Krill 199 Antarctic Peninsula 484 Antarctic Plate 427, 448, 449, 482 Antarctica 47 anthozoans 263 anticyclones 55 and downwelling 60
Antillean Manatee 132, 133 Antilles 444 Antipathes pennacea 272 Anurida maritima 306 Aphrodita aculaeta 276 Aplysia punctata 288 Apogon aureus 363 Appendicularian 321 Aptenodytes forsteri 387 Aptenodytes patagonicus 386 Arabian Basin 452 Arabian Gulf 99 Arabian Plate 427, 452 Arabian Sea 452 Arafura Sea 455, 473 Arcachon Lagoon, Cap Ferret 110 archaea 232, 233 archaeocyathids 227 Archerfish, Banded 131 Arctic Basin, circulation 201 Arctic Char 348 Arctic Jaeger 402 Arctic Ocean 428–29 circulation 200–201 deep-water 201 surface 200 currents 429 depth 169 formation 47 ocean floor 428 salinity 65 sea ice 63, 199, 428 winds 429 Arctic Skua 402 Arctic Tern, migration 220 Arctocephalus australis 407 Arctocephalus gazella 407 Ardea cinerea 394 Arenaria interpres 399 Arenicola marina 276 Argyropelecus aculeatus 349 Aristotle’s lantern 309 Arothron stellatus 371 arthropods 292–94 anatomy 292 classification 208, 294 feeding 292 growth 293 lifestyle 294 reproduction 294, 296 Ascension Island 185, 446 Ascophyllum nodosum 241 Aspitrigla cuculus 362 asthenosphere 44 Astra racing yacht 57 Astrobranchion adhaerens 311 Atacama Trench see Peru–Chile Trench Atlantic Cod 350 Atlantic Conveyor 61, 62–63, 434 Atlantic Flyingfish 354 Atlantic Guitarfish 335 Atlantic Herring 346 Atlantic Mackerel 369 Atlantic Ocean 432–35 central 446–47 circulation 432 depth 169 east 441 icebergs 195, 432 north 434 northwestern 435 ocean floor 432 opening 47 temperature 33, 36 water density layers 37 winds 432 Atlantic Plate 444 Atlantic Puffin 403 Atlantic Sailfish 369 Atlantic Salmon 348 Atlantic Saury 354 Atlantic Thorny Oyster 282 Atlantic Torpedo 336 Atlasov Island 464
atmosphere, Earth 43, 45, 226 atmospheric cells 54 atmospheric circulation 54 atoll, raised 158 atoll formation 152 ATVs see All-Terrain Vehicles Auklet Crested 403 Least 403 auks 384 Aulostomus maculatus 358 Aurelia aurita 264 Australia, southeast 480 Australian Giant Cuttlefish 291 Australian Pelican, Coorong Lagoon 121 Australian Plate 427, 450, 455, 472, 473, 480 Autonomous Underwater Vehicle 187, 485 autonomy 288 Avocet, Pied 398 Awaji Island 83 ayre see tombolo Azores 185, 441 Azores Plateau 441 hotspot 441 Azores–Biscay Rise 441
B
backshore 106 bacteria 232, 233 Baffin Bay 195, 430 Baffin Island 430 Bagre marinus 347 Bahama Banks 156 Bahamas 444 Pink Sands Beach 108 Baja California 471 Balaena mysticetus 412 Balaenoptera acutorostrata 413 Balaenoptera musculus 416 Balearic Basin 442 baleen 416 Balistoides viridescens 370 Ballan Wrasse 142 Baltic Sea 119, 436 depth 169 wind farming 438, 439 Baltica 46 Bamboo, Sea 148 Bamburgh Beach, tidal range 79 Banc d’Arguin 110 Banded Archerfish 131 Banded Coral Shrimp 217 Banded Snake Eel 345 banded-iron formation 45 Bandfish, Red 363 Bangladesh, sea-level rise 91 bank reefs 152 Bannerfish, Longfin 160, 161 bar, baymouth 93 barbels 347 Beluga Sturgeon 342 Gafftopsail Sea Catfish 347 Nurse Shark 325 barchans, Curonian Spit 119 Barclays Adventurer racing yacht 57 Barents Sea 431 phytoplankton bloom 431 Barnacle Acorn 296 Gooseneck 296 barnacles 294 Barra, Sound of 148 Barracuda, Great 369 Barrel Sponge 260 barrel waves 30–31 Barrel-eye 347 barrier islands 93 Hatteras Island 95 barrier reefs 152 barriers, tidal 105
basalt 44, 50 Giant’s Causeway 95 basins, sedimentary 49 basket stars 308 Basking Shark 170, 330 Bass Strait 112, 480 Basslet, Orange Fairy 162–63 Batfish, Polka-dot 352 Bathypterois grallator 349 Bay of Bengal 134, 454 Bay of Biscay 441 Bay of Fundy 80, 126, 435 Mud-shrimp 126 salt marsh 124 Bay of Pigs 133 baymouth bar 93 Bazaruto Achipelago 158 beach black volcanic 112 dissipative 106, 108 Cox’s Bazar 111 Jeffreys Bay 110 Ninety Mile Beach 112 drift-aligned 106 embayed 106, 112, 113 Anjuna Beach 111 gravel 107 pocket 106, 109, 112 raised 89, 96 reflective 106, 107 storm 109 swash-aligned 106 beach cusps 106 beach face 106 Beach Morning-glory 254 beach nourishment 105 beach plants 246 beaches 106–107 composition 107 types 106 zones 106 Beadlet Anemone 268 Beagle Channel 448 Beaked Sea Snake 378 Bear Alaskan Brown 129 Polar 25, 199, 406 threat of global warming 91 Beaufort Gyre 200, 429 Beaufort Sea 430 Bee, Dune Snail 306 Bee Hummingbird 133 Beetle, Intertidal Rove 306 Beggiatoa species 232 Belize Barrier Reef 133 Belize coast mangroves 133 Bellingshausen Island 449 Bellingshausen Sea 484 Bellona Valley 480 Beluga Sturgeon 342 Beluga Whale 116, 199, 417 migration 221 Bengal Tiger 134 Benguela Current 59, 98, 148, 432, 446, 447 benthos 216–217 burrowing 217 fixed 216 mobile 216 symbiosis 217 Bering Sea 460, 462 Bering Strait 201, 428, 462 Beringia land bridge 48 berm 106, 107 Bermuda Platform 156 Bib 350 Big Sur, tectonic uplift 103 Bigeye Jack see Bigeye Trevally Bigeye Trevally 364, 366–67 Bigfin Reef Squid 281 Bignose Unicornfish 368 Bikini Atoll 161, 469 bill adaptation, seabirds 382 biodiversity continental shelves 140 coral reefs 154–55, 211 Shiraho Reef 160
index hotspots 211 Loch Carron 211 Saba Bank 211 sea ice 199 seagrass beds 146 seamounts 175, 211 biogenic sediment 180 bioluminescence 38, 224–25, 233, 236, 265 Common Piddock 283 Deep-sea Cucumber 314 disguise 224 light production 224 lures 225 Stoplight Loosejaw 349 Vampire Squid 291 biomass pyramid 212 bioturbation, mud 315 birds 382–84 anatomy 382 breeding 209, 384 classification 209, 384 feeding 383 habitat 382 migration 384 birds of prey 384 Birgus latro 299 Biscay Plain 441 Bismarck microplate 427, 472 Bismarck Sea 472 bivalves 281 anatomy 278 feeding 280 movement 279 Black Mangrove 130, 132, 135 Black Sea 443 Black Shields 257 Black Skimmer 402 black smokers 188, 478 Black Tar Lichen 257 Black Tufted Lichen 257 Black-browed Albatross 185, 201, 382, 391 Black-footed Albatross 390 Black-hawk, Common 133 Black-legged Kittiwake 401 Black-lip Pearl Oyster 282 Black-winged Stilt 398 Blackdevil, Common 353 Blackdragon, Pacific 349 Blackfin Icefish 365 bleaching coral 153, 158, 159, 160, 161 effect of El Niño 68 Bledius spectabilis 306 Blenny Spiny-headed 16–17 Tompot 368 Blindfish, Gelatinous 183 bloom algal, Chesapeake Bay 116 plankton 35, 39, 164, 169, 431 blubber 404 Blue Buttons 264 Blue Mussel see Common Mussel Blue Ridge Coral 160 Blue Shark 334 Blue Sponge 261 Blue Swimming Crab 303 Blue Whale 416 migration 421 Blue-footed Booby 395 blue-green algae 233 Blue-rayed Limpet 147, 148 Blue-ringed Octopus 290 Blue-spotted Stingray 336 Bluecheek Butterflyfish 363 Bluestripe Snapper 161, 363 Blunt-nosed Chimera see Spotted Ratfish Bluntnose Sixgill Shark 327 Bobbit Worm 276 Bohadschia graffei 314 boiler reef 156 boiling point, water 33 Bolbometopon muricatum 365 Bonefish 343 Bonellia viridis 316 Bonin Petrel 392 Booby Blue-footed 395 Brown 395 Bootlace Worm 275 Bora-Bora, Society Islands 88, 92, 161, 460
bores see tidal bores Boring Sponge 217 Bosporus 443 Botryllus schlosseri 321 Bottlenose Dolphin 123, 418 bottom-living animals invertebrates 315 see also benthos boundary currents 59 Bowhead Whale 412 Box Jellyfish 266 Boxfish, Spotted 370 brachiopods, Cambrian 227 Brahmaputra delta 134, 454 Brahminy Kite 397 Bramble Shark 325 Branchiostoma lanceolatus 321 Brant Goose 150, 385 Branta bernicla 385 Brazil Basin 446 Brazil Current 59, 432, 446, 448 Breadcrumb Sponge 261 breakers plunging 77; see also barrel waves; tube waves spilling 77 breakwaters 105 breezes, offshore and onshore 55 Bristletail, Shore 306 bristleworms 276 Brittlestar Common 311 Mangrove 131 brittlestars 177, 308 Broad Fish Tapeworm 274 Brosme brosme 351 Brown Bear, Alaskan 129 Brown Booby 395 Brown Noddy 401 Brown Pelican 214, 383, 384, 395 Brown Sargassum 238 brown seaweeds 238–39 Brush-turkey, Red-billed 135 Bryopsis plumosa 248 Bryozoan Gelatinous 307 Pink Lace 307 bryozoans 307 Bubble Shell 288 Buenos Aires 118 Bufoceratias wedli 352 Bull Kelp 150, 151 Bullhead, Long-spined 359 Bullhead Shark 325 Bullina lineata 288 buoyancy animals 258 fish 339 Burdwood Bank 449 Burma Plate 454 Bushy Black Coral 272 Butterflyfish Bluecheek 363 Milletseed 161 Button Mangrove 130 By-the-Wind Sailor 214
C Cactus Seaweed 249 Calappa angusta 299 calcareous ooze 180, 181 calcium, in seawater 34 calcium carbonate 67, 180, 181 compensation depth 181 sclerites 262 Calidris alpinus 399 California, temperature 33 California Current 58, 59, 66, 461 California Sea Lion 407 Callorhinchus milii 326 Callorhinus ursinus 407 Calothrix crustacea 233 calving, iceberg 192, 195 Cambrian ocean life 227 plate tectonics 46 camouflage bony fish 340 photophores 38, 224 Campbell Island 480 Campbell Plateau 480 Canada Basin 428
Canaries Current 432, 444, 446 Canary Islands 441 Cancer pagurus 302 Cancun 132 Candy Stripe Flatworm 273 Canton City see Guanghzou canyon submarine 176 Monterey 471 Cap Ferret 110 Cape Cod 435 salt marshes 126 Cape Creus 96 Cape Hatteras 95 lighthouse 95 Cape Horn 448 Cape Penguin see Jackass Penguin Capelin 347 Capelinhos volcano 441 capillary waves 76 Caranx sexfasciatus 364 Carapus acus 351 carbon cycle 67 carbon dioxide early Earth 45 in oceans 67 in seawater 34, 35 carbon sink 35, 67 carbonates, continental shelf 141 Carboniferous, plate tectonics 46 Carcharius taurus 330 Carcharodon carcharias 331 Carcinus maenas 302 Cardinalfish 131, 135 Ring-tailed 363 Caretta caretta 374 Caribbean Plate 444 Caribbean Reef Shark 229 Caribbean Sea 444 depth 169 Caribbean Spiny Lobster, migration 220 Carlsberg Ridge 185, 452 Carnation Coral 267 Carnegie Ridge 478 Caroline Plate 427, 472 Carpetshark 325 Carpilius maculatus 302 Carpophyllum flexuosum 150 Carrageen Moss see Irish Moss carrageenan 245 cartilaginous fish 324–25 caruncles 314 Caryophyllia smithii 271 Carysfort Reef 156 Cascadia Basin 463 Caspian Tern 401 Cassiopeia andromeda see Cassiopeia xamachana Cassiopeia xamachana 266 cassiterite, Andaman Sea 454 Casuarina 247, 255 Casuarina equisetifolia 255 catamarans, ocean yacht racing 57 catastrophe, iron 42 catfish 341 Gafftopsail Sea 347 Striped 258, 347 Catshark, Chain 331 caudofoveates 281 Caulerpa racemosa 249 Caulerpa taxifolia 249 Caulophryn jordani 352 caves 93 as habitat 143 caviar 342 Cavoline, Three-tooth 288 Cavolinia tridentata 288 Caymen Trench 169 cays, Caribbean Sea 444 cells atmospheric 54 convection 43, 44, 46, 50 Ferrel 54 Hadley 54 Langmuir 61 polar 54 Cenozoic, ocean life 228 Central Atlantic Ocean 446–47 Central Bay, San Francisco 123 cephalopods 281 anatomy 278 chromatophores 279 feeding 280
movement 279 reproduction 281 Cepola macrophthalma 363 Cerastoderma edule 283 cerata, Polybranchid 288 Ceratium tripos 235 Cerianthus membranaceous 272 Ceryle rudis 403 Cestium veneris 319 cetaceans 404–405 Cetorhinus maximus 330 Chaenocephalus aceratus 365 Chaetoceros danicus 235 Chaetodon semilarvatus 363 Chaetognatha 319 Chagos Bank 459 Chagos–Laccadive Plateau 450, 452 Chain Catshark 331 Chain Moray Eel 344 chalk, erosion, White Cliffs of Dover 96 Challenger, HMS 171 Challenger Deep 171, 469 Challenger Plateau 480 champignon (mushroom rock) 158 Changjiang Estuary see Yangtze Estuary Chanos chanos 346 Chao Phraya River, discharge into South China Sea 467 Char, Arctic 348 Charcot Seamounts 441 charge imbalance 32 Charonia tritonis 287, 311 Chatham Rise 480 Chauliodus sloani 348 Chaunax endeavouri 353 Cheilopogon heterurus 354 chelicerates 294 Chelonia mydas 112, 374 chemistry, seawater 34–35 Chesapeake Bay 114, 116 Chesil Bank 109 Chesil Beach 109 Chilara taylori 351 Chile, fjordlands 103 Chimaera monstrosa 326 Chimera Blunt-nosed see Spotted Ratfish Plownose 326 chimeras 324–325 chimneys, hydrothermal vents 188 Chinese White Dolphin 122 Chinstrap Penguin 387 Chionis alba 398 Chironex fleckeri 266 Chirostylus Crab 179 Chiton, Lined 291 chitons 281 Chlamydoselachus anguineus 327 chloride ions 34 chlorophyll plants 246 satellite measurement 187 chloroplasts 235, 250 Chondrus crispus 245 chop and swell waves 76 chordates, classification 209 Christmas Tree Worm 217, 277 chromatophores 290 cephalopods 279 Chromodorid Sea Slug 288 Chromodoris lochi 288 chrysophyta 237 Chukchi Sea 428, 462 Cichlid, Mayan 133 ciliates 237 Ciona intestinalis 320 circulation atmospheric 54 effect of El Niño/La Niña 68–69 oceanic Antarctic ice shelves 193 Arctic Ocean deep-water 201 surface 200 Atlantic Ocean 434 Bay of Bengal 454 and climate change 48, 65 deep-water 61, 201
Langmuir cells 61 Southern Ocean 201 surface 58–59, 200 underwater 60–61 and water density 37 see also currents, ocean Circumpolar Current 48 creation 47 Cirrhipathes species 272 cladistics 206 Cladococcus viminalis 237 cladogram 206 Cladophora, Giant 249 Cladophora mirabilis 249 Clam Giant 278, 283, 284–85 Pacific Razor 129 Clapper Rail 127 classification 206–209 Clatsop Spit 93 clay sediment 180, 181 Cleaner Wrasse 365 Cleidopus gloriamaris 354 cliff, undercut 93 cliffs underwater 143 uplifted 89 climate change and Arctic Ocean salinity 65 Atlantic Conveyor 61, 62–63, 434 Gondwana breakup 48 Mesozoic 48 ocean circulation 48 and sea-level 49, 88 Cloak Anemone 269 cloud formation 64 satellite monitoring 187 von Karman vortices 52–53 Clownfish 24, 217 Clupea harengus 346 cnidarians 262–63 anatomy 262 classification 263 reproduction 263 zooxanthellae 263 cnidocytes 262 CO2 carbon cycle 67 early Earth 45 in oceans 67 in seawater 34, 35 coastlines drowned 88 emergent 89 coasts 86–87, 92–93 artificial 92, 99 breezes 55 classification 92 defenses 105 fringing reef 92 marine-deposition 93 pollution 141 primary 92 and sea-level change 88–89, 92 secondary 92 volcanic 92 wave-erosion 93 Cobb Hotspot 463 coccolithophore 181, 237 coccoliths 237 Cochlearia officinalis 254 Cockle, Common Edible 283 cockling, Morecambe Bay 127 Coconut Palm 247, 255 Cocos nucifera 255 Cocos Plate 427, 478 Cod Atlantic 350 overfishing 212 Codium fragile 248 Codium tomentosum 249 Coelacanth 341, 342, 459 Indonesian 342 Coelenterata see cniderians Coeloplana astericola 319 Coffinfish 353 Coho Salmon 348 migration 220 cold accretion 42 cold currents 66 cold seeps 189 cold-water coral 153, 179 Coleopa frigida 306
495
496
index Coleroon Estuary 134 Collared Kingfisher 403 Colon Ridge 478 Colonial Sea Squirt 321 colonies, invertebrate 258 Colossendeis australis 295 color, sea 38, 39 color change, cuttlefish 279 Colpomenia peregrina 240 Colpophyllia natans 271 Columbia Bay 112 Comb Jelly Creeping 319 Predatory 319 comets, as source of water 45 commensalism 217, 294 Sea-Star Shrimp 310 Common Black-hawk 133 Common Blackdevil 353 Common Bluestripe Snapper 363 Common Brittlestar 311 Common Diving Petrel 393 Common Dolphin 26–27, 418 Common Edible Cockle 283 Common Eider 385 eiderdown 385 Common Fangtooth 355 Common Glasswort 252, 253 Common Jellyfish, larva 214 Common Limpet 286 Common Lobster 299 Common Loon 390 Common Murre 14, 382–83, 402 Common Mussel 282 Common Periwinkle 287 Common Piddock 283 Common Sea Fan 267 Common Sea Lavender 254 Common Sea Squirt 320 Common Seal 408 Common Shelduck 385 Common Shore Crab 302 larva 214 Common Shrimp 298 Common Skate 335 Common Sole 370 Common Squid 291 Common Stargazer 368 Common Tern 128 Comoros 459 compensation depth, calcium carbonate 181 concretions, mineral, Moeraki Beach 112 Condylactis gigantea 268 Conger conger 344 Conger Eel 344 Congo Fan 447 Congo River 447 Congo River estuary 114 consumers 212 continental crust 44 continental drift 46–47 continental rise 177 continental shelf 140–41 geology 141 continental slope 176 convection cells, mantle 43, 44, 46, 50 convergent plate boundary 50 conveyor global ocean 61, 62–63, 434 see also Atlantic Conveyor Cook, Captain James (1728–79) 123, 449, 477 Cook Islands 477 Cook Strait, currents 79 Cookie Cutter Shark 328 Coorong Lagoon 121 Copacabana Beach 108 Copepod, Cyclopoid 296 copepods 170 Copper Shark 213 Coral Blue Ridge 160 Bushy Black 272 Carnation 267 Daisy 270 Dendrophyllid 271 Devonshire Cup 271 Fast-Pulse 267 Giant Brain 271 Hump 270
Lophelia 178, 179, 271 Mediterranean Red 268 jewelry 262 Mushroom 271 Mushroom Leather 266 Organ Pipe 266 Table 270 Whip 272 coral reefs 138–39, 152–55 biodiversity 154–55 destruction 155, 160, 179 zones 154–55 Coral Sea 473 Coral Shrimp, Banded 217 Coral Weed 244 coraline algae 239 Corallina officinalis 244 Coralline Sponge 261 Corallium rubrum 262, 268 corals bleaching 153, 158, 159, 160, 161 effect of El Niño 68 cold-water 153, 179 hurricane damage 71 reef-building 262–63 anatomy 262 stony 153, 158 warm-water 153 Cordgrass Saltmeadow 126 Smooth 124, 126, 127 Cordilleran Ice Sheet 48 core, Earth 42–43 Coriolis effect 54 water 58 wind 55, 70 Cormorant Great 397 Guanay 384, 396 Cornish kelp forest 148 Corryvreckan Whirlpool 81 Corynactis viridis 269 Coryphaena hippurus 364 Coryphaenoides acrolepis 351 Coscinodiscus granii 235 Cotton’s Seaweed 245 Couch’s Goby 148 Cow Shark 325 Cowrie, Tiger 287 Cox’s Bazar 111 Crab Blue Swimming 303 Chirostylus 179 Common Shore 302 larva 214 Dungeness 123 Edible 302 Ghost 303 Hermit 134, 269 Reef 299 Horseshoe 292, 295 Hydrothermal Vent 189 Japanese Spider 299 Long-legged Spider 302 Nodose Box 299 Orange Fiddler 303 Pea 217, 302 Porcelain 293, 299, 300–301 Red, migration 304, 305 Robber 158, 299 Sand Bubbler 292 Spotted Reef 302 Velvet 294 Crabeater Seal 409 Creagrus furcatus 400 Creeping Comb Jelly 319 Crested Auklet 403 Cretaceous ocean life 228 plate tectonics 47 Cretan Trough 443 crinoids, fossil 313 Crocodile American 132, 133, 381 Cuban 133 Estuarine 135, 381 Indo-Pacific 381 Morelet’s 132 Nile 134 Saltwater 136–37, 373, 381 crocodiles 372–73 Crocodylus acutus 381 Crocodylus porosus 136–37, 381 Crocus, Sand 246
Crofter’s Wig 241 Crown of Thorns Starfish 158, 161, 309, 311 predator 287 crust Earth continental 43, 44, 46 oceanic 43, 44, 46, 50 crustaceans 294 Cryptocentrus cinctus 368 Cryptoclidus eurymerus 228 ctenidia 279 Ctenophora 319 Cuban Crocodiles 133 Cuban Gar 133 Cuban Hutia 133 Cuckoo Wrasse 365 reproduction 340 Cucumber Deep-sea 314 Edible Sea 314 Sea 144, 181, 223, 314 Culcita novaeguineae 310 Curonian Lagoon 119 Curonian Spit 119 currents ocean 47 Aghulas Current 450, 451, 459 Alaska Current 461, 463 Aleutian Current 463 Antarctic Circumpolar Current 195, 201, 432, 448, 460, 482 Antarctic Coastal Current 201 Arctic Ocean 429 Atlantic Conveyor 61, 62– 63, 434 Atlantic Ocean 432 Benguela Current 59, 98, 148, 432, 446, 447 boundary 59 Brazil Current 59, 432, 446, 448 California Current 58, 59, 66, 461 Circumpolar Current 48 creation 47 cold 66 East Greenland Current 59, 429, 431, 434 Equatorial Countercurrent 446, 450, 451, 455, 473, 477 Equatorial Undercurrent 446, 473 Falklands Current 448 Guiana Current 432, 446 Guinea Current 447 Gulf Stream 33, 66, 432, 435, 444 Atlantic Conveyor 63 map by Benjamin Franklin 59 heat transfer 33, 58, 66 Humboldt Current 380, 460, 461, 478, 479 Indian Ocean 451, 455 interaction 59 Jan Mayen Current 431 Kuroshio Current 58, 59, 66, 460, 461, 463, 464, 466, 469 Labrador Current 59, 116, 195, 430, 435 Liman Current 150 Malvinas current 59 Mesozoic 48 North Atlantic Drift 59, 66, 431, 432, 434, 435, 436 Atlantic Conveyor 63 North Equatorial Current 432, 444, 450, 451, 460 Norwegian Atlantic Current 429, 436 Oyashio Current 59, 461, 464 Pacific Ocean 460, 461 Peruvian Current 66, 346, 461 South Equatorial Current 446, 450, 451, 455, 459, 460, 473, 477, 479 Southern Ocean 482
surface 58–59, 66 Transpolar Current 200, 201, 428, 429 Tsushima Current 150, 466 warm 66 rip 110 subsurface 60 tidal 79 turbidity 176 Cushion Star 310 Cusk-eel, Spotted 351 Cuskeel 183 Cuttlefish Australian Giant 291 eggs 281 color change 279 Cuvier’s Beaked Whale 417 cyanobacteria 226, 232, 233, 257 Cyclades 443 Cycliophoran 318 cyclones 55, 70–71 East China Sea 466 Timor Sea 455 and upwelling 60 see also hurricanes Cyclopoid Copepod 296 Cyclopterus lumpus 362 Cyerce nigricans 288 Cymbula compressa 148 Cyphoma gibbosum 287 Cypraea tigris 287
D Daisy Coral 270 Damsel Fish see Sergeant Major Danish Straits 436 Danube delta 443 Dardanelles 443 Dardanus megistos 299 Darien Mangroves 135 dark zone 168, 171, 219 Darwin, Charles (1809–82) 296, 448 Darwin Mounds 179 Dasyatis americana 336–337 Dead Man’s Fingers 216, 266 Dead Sea, salinity 37 Deccan Traps 459 decompression, divers 37 Deep Flight submersibles 173 Deep Rover submersible 223 Deep Sea Red Prawn 298 Deep-sea Angler 225, 352 Deep-sea Cucumber 314 deep-sea habitat 222–223 food 223 pressure 222 see also abyssal plain; abyssal zone; dark zone Deep-sea Jellyfish 264 deep-sea sediment 180, 182, 223 defenses, coastal 105 Delphinapterus leucas 417 Delphinus delphis 418 Deltaworks, Netherlands, stormsurge barriers 105 Dendronephthya species 267 Dendrophyllia species 271 Dendrophyllid Coral 271 Denmark Strait 434 density, seawater 37 deposition, coasts 93 depression see cyclones depth oceans 169 satellite estimates 187 Dermochelys coriacea 113, 375 deserts, ocean 219 Desmarestia aculeata 240 Devil’s-claw, Grand 255 Devon Ria Coast 96 Devonian ocean life 227 plate tectonics 46 Devonshire Cup coral 271 dhows 453 Diadema savignyi 312 Diadema setosum 312 Diamond-backed Terrapin 126 diamonds, Namibia 447 diatoms 169, 181, 235 siliceous 35
Dictyocha fibula 237 Didemnum molle 321 Diego Garcia Atoll 159 differentiation, Earth structure 42, 43, 44–45 Digul River 135 dinoflagellates 235–37 bioluminescence 225 sunlit zone 169 Dinophysis acuta 236 Diodon histrix 371 Diomedea exulans 391 Diphyllobothrium latum 274 Dipterus batis 335 discharge, river 34, 63, 65, 200, 428, 467 dissipative beach 106, 108, 110, 111, 112 diurnal tides 78 divergent plate boundary 50 divers (seabirds) 382–383, 384, 395 Divided Flatworm 274 diving (human) decompression 37 effect on environment 475 free 168 scuba 173, 475 tourism 475 DNA 206, 226 archaea 232 Dog Whelk 286 Dogfish, Piked 327 Dogfish Shark 325 Dogger Bank 436 doldrums 432, 461 Dolicholaimus marioni 316 Dolphin Bottlenose 123, 418 Chinese White 122 Common 26–27, 418 Indo-European Humpback 418 Irrawaddy 135 La Plata 118 Long-snouted Spinner 418 Risso’s 418 Dolphinfish 364 dolphins, echolocation 39, 404 Dongjin estuary 129 Doubtful Sound 123 Dover Strait 437 White Cliffs 96, 180 downwelling 60 epicontinental seas 47 Greenland Sea 431 Drachiella spectabilis 245 Dragonfish 224 Drake Passage 448, 482 drift, continental 46–47 drift-aligned beach 106 drowned valleys 88, 148 Duck, Magellanic Flightless Steamer 385 ducks 384 Dugong 134, 150, 158, 405, 423 importance of seagrass 146 see also Paddle Weed Dugong dugon 423 Dumbo Octopus 290 dune buggies, effect on sand dunes 113 Dune Snail Bee 306 dunes see sand dunes Dungeness Crab 123 Dungeness Spit (Washington State, US) 113 Dunlin 399 Durdle Door 92
E Eagle Singapore Bald see Brahminy Kite White-bellied Sea 397 Eagle Ray 158, 160, 204 Earth atmosphere 43, 45 convection 43 differentiation 43, 44–45 formation 42–43
index internal heat 42 origin of life 226 rotation 54 structure 43, 44–45 earthquakes 51 Gulf of California 471 Japan 464 Peru–Chile Trench 479 Indian Ocean 456 East Atlantic Red Gurnard 362 East Australian Current 66, 460, 461, 480 East Azores Fracture Zone 441 East China Sea 466 East Greenland Current 59, 429, 431, 434 East Pacific Rise 175, 185, 460, 478, 480 East Scotia Ridge 449 East Sea/Sea of Japan see 150, 464 East Wind Drift 195 Easter Island 479 Easter Island Fracture Zone 479 Eastern Box Turtle 126 Eastern Mediterranean 442 Eastern Scheldt Estuary 119 storm surge-barrier 104 Ebrié Lagoon 121 ecdysis 293 Echeneis naucrates 364 Echidna catenata 344 Echiniscoides sigismundi 318 Echinoderes aquilonius 318 echinoderms 308–309 anatomy 308 classification 208, 308 defense 309 feeding 309 reproduction 309 Echinodiscus auritus 312 Echinus esculentus 312 Echninocardium cordatum 313 echolocation 39, 404 Ecklonia maxima 148 Ecklonia radiata 150 ecotourism 475 eddies 79 Ediacaran fauna 226 Edible Crab 302 Edible Sea Cucumber 314 Edible Sea Urchin 312 Eel Banded Snake 345 Chain Moray 344 Conger 344 European 344 Gulper 345 Ribbon 344 Sand 368, 403 Slender Snipe 344 Spotted Garden 345 Eelgrass 148, 150, 252 Eelpout 189 eels 341 migration 220 see also Sargasso Sea Egret Great 125 Little 394 Pacific Reef 394 Reddish 132 egrets 384 Egretta garzetta 394 Egretta sacra 394 Eider Common 385 eiderdown 385 Ekman, Walfrid (1874–1954) 58 Ekman spiral 58 Ekman transport 58, 60 El Niño 68 Peru–Chile Trench 479 El Niño Southern Oscillation 36, 68, 460 electrons 32 Elephant Fish see Plownose Chimaera Elephant Seal 222 collecting salinity and temperature data 61 Northern 409 pressure adaptations 37
Elops saurus 343 embayed beach 106, 111, 112, 113 Emiliania huxleyi 237 Emperor Penguin 190–91, 192– 93, 383, 387, 388–89 Emperor Seamounts 470 Emydocephalus annulatus 379 endemic species 218 energy cycles 212 Enewetak Atoll 161, 469 English Channel 436, 437 formation 96 Engraulis ringens 346 Enhalus acoroides 149 Enhydra lutris 406 Enhydrina schistosa 378 Ensis americanus 283 Entelurus aequoreus 358 Enteroctopus dofleini 290 Enteromorpha species 248 Envisat satellite 187 Eocene, plate tectonics 47 epicontinental seas 47 Epinephelus tukula 362 Eptatretus burgeri 323 Eptatretus stouti 323 Equatorial Countercurrent 446, 450, 451, 455, 473, 477 Equatorial Undercurrent 446, 473 Eretmochelys imbricata 374 erosion coastal defenses 105 wave 93, 96–97 erosion gully 176 Eschrichtius robustus 412 estuaries 114–15 environment 115 formation 114 inverse 122 tectonic, San Francisco Bay 123 types 114 Ethmodiscus rex 235 Etmopterus spinax 328 Etna 442 Eubalaena glacialis 412 Eucheuma cottonii see Kappaphycus cottonii Eudyptes chrysolophus 387 Eudyptula minor 387 eukaryotes 207, 226 Eulalia viridis 276 Euphausia superba 297 Euphrates see Tigris–Euphrates Delta Euramerica 46 Eurasian Oystercatcher 382, 398 Eurasian Plate 441, 442, 443, 452, 455, 464 European Eel 344 European Otter 406 European Sturgeon 342 Eurythenes 223 Evadne nordmanni 295 evaporation 64–65 inverse estuary 122 evaporites, continental shelf 141 Everglades 132–33 evolution, parallel 47 Explorer Plate 463 Exquisite Lined Flatworm 274 extinction, mass 228, 229 Exxon Valdez oil spillage 463 Eyelight Fish 354
F FAD see Fish Attracting Device Faeroe–Iceland Ridge 436 Fairy Prion 392 Fairy Tern see White Tern Falkland Islands 448 Falkland Plateau 449 Falklands Current 448 Falmouth Bay 148 False Clown Anemonefish 364 fan, outwash 176 Fangtooth 171, 223 Common 355 Fantgataufa 477 Farallon Plate 463
faros 159 fast ice 198 Fast-pulse Coral 267 Fastnet Race 57 fault scarps 98 faults Red Sea Coast 98 transform 446 Feather Star Passion Flower 313 Tropical 313 feather stars 308 Ferrel cells 54 fetch 76 Fiddler Crab, ritual display 303 Fiji Plate 473 Fiji Plateau 473 Filchner–Ronne Ice Shelf 484 Filefish, Scrawled 370 fins, fish 338 Fire Urchin 309 Firefly Squid 38, 224 first-year ice 198 fish anadromous 220 bony 338–41 anatomy 338 buoyancy 339 camouflage 340 classification 209, 341 hunting 340 protection 340 reproduction 339 senses 339 swimming 338 cartilaginous 324–25 anatomy 324 classification 209, 325 hunting senses 325 reproduction 325 catadromous 220 classification 209 jawless 209, 227, 322 lobe-finned 227 migration 220 vision 38 Fish Attracting Device 215 fish farming 338, 357 Fish eagle, Madagascar 134 Fisher Bank 436 fisheries continental shelf 140, 165 continental slope 176 Gulf of California 471 sand eel 165, 357, 403 fishing 357 bycatch 357 damage to deep-water reefs 179, 357 deep-sea 356 East China Sea 466 hazard to wildlife 357, 383 industrial 357 traditional 357, 455, 467 Fishing Cat 134 fjordlands, Chile 103 fjords 88, 114, 115, 140 Alaska 463 Flaccid Green Seaweed 248 Flame Shell 144, 145 Flamingo, Greater 132, 133 Flamingo Tongue 287 Flashlight Fish 224 Flatback Turtle 375 flatfish 341 Flatworm Acoel 273 Candy Stripe 273 Divided 274 Exquisite Lined 274 Imitating 274 Thysanoon 274 flatworms 273 Fleet Lagoon, Chesil Bank 109 Flightless Rail 158 floating objects, as habitat 215 floats, gas-filled 258 flooding, coastal defenses 105 Florida Manatee 133 Florida Reef Tract 156 Flower Urchin 309, 312 Flustra foliacea 307 Fly River 135 Flyingfish, Atlantic 354
fog over cold currents 66 northern Chile 66 San Francisco 67 Skeleton coast 66, 98, 447 Foncia racing trimaran 57 food, at depth 223 food chain 35, 212 food web 212 food-energy pyramid 212 Football Jersey Worm 275 foraminifera 108, 181, 237 foreshore 106 Fragum erugatum 111 Franklin, Benjamin (1706–90) 59 Franz Joseph Land 431 Fratercula arctica 403 frazil ice 198 free diving 168 freezing point, seawater 37, 198 Fregata minor 394 French Frigate Shoals, near-atoll 161 freshwater global 64 inflow 65 Frigatebird, Great 384, 394 Frilled Shark 325, 327 fringes, coastal, biodiversity 140 fringing reef 152 fugu see pufferfish Fulmar, Northern 392 Fulmarus glacialis 392 Funafuti Atoll, sea-level rise 91 fungi 256 Fungia scruposa 271 Fur Seal Antarctic 407 New Zealand 123 Northern 407 South American 407 Furbelows 148
G gabbro 44 Gadus morhua 350 Gafftopsail Sea Catfish 347 Gaidropsaurus mediterraneus 351 Gakkel Ridge 428 Galápagos Islands 92, 478 hotspot 478 influence of Peruvian Current 66, 478 lava flow 21 Marine Iguana 380, 478 Galápagos Penguin 218, 478 Galeocerdo cuvier 334 Gambia Estuary 120 Gambier Islands 477 Ganges delta 134, 177 Ganges Fan 454 Gannet, Northern 382, 384, 395 Gar, Cuban 133 Garden Eel, Spotted 345 Garofalo Whirlpool 82 gas, in seawater 35 gas deposits Bass Strait 112, 480 East China Sea 466 sedimentary basins 49 South China Sea 467 Gasterosteus aculeatus 359 gastropods 281 anatomy 278 feeding 280 movement 279 Gastrotrich 318 Gavia immer 390 Gavial 134 Gazi Bay 149 Gecarcoidea natalis, migration 304, 305 geese 384 Geiranger Fjord 115 Gelatinous Blindfish 183 Gelatinous Bryozoan 307 Gelidium foliaceum 244 Georges Bank 435 geotube 105 Gerupuk Bay 149 Ghost Crab 303 Giant Anemone 268
Giant Brain Coral 271 Giant Cladophora 249 Giant Clam 278, 283, 284–85 Giant Kelp 146–47, 151, 240, 242–43 destruction by Purple Sea Urchin 312 Sea Otters 406 Giant Leaf Worm 274 Giant Mussel Shrimp 297 Giant Octopus 290 Giant Pyrosome 258, 321 Giant Sea Spider 295 Giant Triton 287, 311 Giant Tube Worm 317 Giant’s Causeway 94–95 Gigantocypris muelleri 297 gills, fish 338 Gippsland Lakes 112 Gironde Estuary 120 glacial cycle 88 glaciation Alaskan mudflats 129 Chilean fjordlands 103 Puget Sound 102 glaciers 192, 194, 195 global warming, Peruvian Andes 91 Glass Squid 291 Glasswort Common 252, 253 The Wash 128 Glaucium flavum 254 Global Challenge yacht race 57 global ocean conveyor 61, 62–63, 434 global warming Antarctic ice-shelf breakup 487 Arctic Ocean 65 Atlantic Conveyor 61, 62–63, 434 and sea-level change 88, 91, 487 global water cycle 64–65 Globicephala melas 422 Glossobalanus samiensis 316 Goblin Shark 331 Goby Couch’s 148 Yellow Shrimp 368 Golden Dune Moss 251 Golden Gate channel 123 tide rip 82 Golfingia vulgaris 316 Gondwana 46, 47 breakup 482 climate change 48 Falkland Islands 449 Goniocorella dumosa 179 Goniopora djiboutiensis 270 Goose, Brant 150, 385 Goosefoot Starfish 310 Gooseneck barnacle 296 Gorda Plate 463 Gorgonia ventalina 267 gorgonin 267 Grampus griseus 418 Grand Bahama Canyon 176 Grand Banks 435 Grand Cayman, “stingray city” 337 Grand Devil’s-claw 255 Grand Prix de Fécamp Yacht Race 57 granite 44 Seychelles 459 gravel beach 107 sea bed 144 gravitation, Earth 42 Gray Heron 394 Gray Lichen 257 Gray Nurse Shark see Sand Tiger Shark Gray Phalarope 384, 399 Gray Plover 398 Gray Reef Shark 229 Gray Seal 408, 410–11 Humber Estuary 119 Gray Whale 412 migration 421 Gray-headed Albatross 201 grease ice 198 Great Bahama Bank 156 Great Barracuda 369
497
498
index Great Barrier Reef 161, 162–63, 473 Great Black-backed Gull 400 Great Blue Hole 157 Great Cormorant 397 Great Egret 125 Great Frigatebird 394 Great Ice Barrier 192 Great Salt Marsh, Cape Cod 126 Great Scallop 282 Great Shearwater 393 Great Skua 402 Great White Shark see White Shark Greater Antilles 444 Greater Flamingo 132, 133 Greater Pipefish 146 Greater Weever 368 grebes 384 green algae 125, 250 Green Humphead Parrotfish 365 Green Paddle Worm 276 Green Turtle 112, 158, 374 importance of seagrass 146 greenhouse gas 67 Greenland Ice Coast 94 Greenland Ice Sheet 48, 434 global warming prediction 91 Greenland Sea 428, 431 Greenland Shark 328 Greenland–Iceland Rise 343 Grenadier, Pacific 351 Grimpoteuthis plena 290 Ground Shark 325 grounding line 192 groundwater 64 Grouper, Potato 362 groynes 105 Gruinard Bay, post-glacial rebound 96 Guadalupe Seamount, biodiversity 211 Guaíba estuary 117 Guanay Cormorant 384, 396 Guanghzou 122 guano 396 see also Jackass Penguin Guérande salt marsh 128 Guiana Current 432, 446 Guinea Current 447 Guitarfish, Atlantic 335 Gulf of Aden 452 Gulf of Alaska 463 Gulf of Aqaba, coral reef 158 Gulf of Bothnia 436 Gulf of California 471 Gulf of Corryvreckan 81 Gulf of Finland 436 Gulf of Guinea 447 tectonic triple junction 447 Gulf of Maine 435 Gulf of Mexico 116, 117, 444 Gulf of Odessa 443 Gulf of Oman 452 Gulf of St. Lawrence 116, 435 Gulf Stream 33, 66, 432, 435, 444 Atlantic Conveyor 63 map by Benjamin Franklin 59 Gulf of Thailand 467 Gulf of Tongking 467 Gulfweed 238 Gull Great Black-backed 400 Herring 400 Ivory 401 Laughing 401 Swallow-tailed 400 gulls 384 gully, erosion 176 Gulper Eel 345 Gurnard, East Atlantic Red 362 Guyot, Arnold Henry (1807–84) 174 guyots 174, 184 Gygis alba 401 Gymnodinium pulchellum 237 gypsum 34 gyres ocean 58 Arctic 428 Atlantic 432, 446 Comoros 459 Guatemala Basin 478
Gulf of Alaska 463 Indian Ocean 450 North Pacific 471 Pacific Ocean 460 South Pacific 477, 479 Southern Ocean 482, 483 upwelling and downwelling 60
H H2O molecule 32 Ha Long Bay, karst 102 hadal zone 168, 171, 219 Hadley cells 54 Haematopus ostralegus 398 Hagfish 182, 322, 323 Japanese 323 Pacific 323 Hairy Angler 352 Haliaeetus leucogaster 397 Haliastur indus 397 Halibut, Pacific 123 Halichoerus grypus 408 Halichondria panicea 261 Haliclystus auricula 264 Halimeda opuntia 249 Haliotis rufescens 286 halite 34 Halobacterium salinarium 233 Halobates 214, 294 Halobates sericeus 306 halocline 37 Halodule wrightii 148 halophiles 233 Halophilia ovalis 253 halophytes 251, 253 Halosphaera viridis 250 Hamelin Pool 150 Hammerhead Shark 324–25 Scalloped 334 Hapalochlaena maculosa 290 Haplophryne mollis 353 Harbor Porpoise 422 Harbor Seal see Common Seal Hardanger Fjord 119 Harlequin Ghost Pipefish 358 Harlequin Shrimp, molting 293 Harlequin Sweetlips 363 Harp Seal 408 Harrier Marsh 128 Northern 126 Hastigerina pelagica 237 Hatchetfish 224 Lovely 349 Hatteras Island 95 Havelock Island 454 Hawaii lava coast 103 Hawaiian Archipelago 51, 161, 470 circulation 470 Hawksbill Turtle 158, 374, 376– 77, 474 hazard from fishing 357 headlands, erosion 93 heat, internal, early Earth 42, 43 heat capacity 33 heating, solar 54, 66 Heinrich Events 195 Heliopora coerulea 160 Hellenic Trough 169, 443 hemocyanin 279 hemolymph 292 Hennediella heimii 251 Heptranchias perlo 327 hermaphrodites 281 Hermissenda crassicorni 288 Hermissenda Sea Slug 288 Hermit Crab 134 Heron Gray 394 Madagascar 134 herons 384 Herring, Atlantic 346 Herring Gull 400 herrings 341 Heterochone calyx 260 Heteroconger hassi 345 Heterodontus portusjacksoni 329 Hexabranchus sanguineus 289 Hexanchus griseus 327 Highfin Lizardfish 177
Hikurangi Trench 480 Himantopus himantopus 398 Himantura uarnak 335 Hippocampus bargibanti 359 Hippocampus hippocampus 358 Hirondella gigas 183 Histrio histrio 353 HMS Challenger 171 Hokkaido 464 Holacanthus ciliaris 363 holoplankton 214 Holothuria edulis 314 Homarus gammarus 299 Homotrema rubrum 108 Honeycomb Worm 277 Hong Kong Harbor 99 Honshu 464 Hoorn Island 448 Hoplostethus atlanticus 355 hormogonia 233 Hormosira banksii 241 Horn Shark 325 Horned-poppy, Yellow 254 Hornwrack 307 Horseshoe Crab 292 American 295 Horseshoe Worm 315, 316 hotspots 51, 174, 184 Azores Plateau 441 Cobb 463 Galapagos Islands 478 Hawaii 161, 470 Kerguelen 455 Marquesas Islands 477 Marshall Islands 469 Pacific Ocean 460, 470 Réunion 51, 459 Hound Needlefish 354 Huang He see Yellow River Humber Estuary 119 Humboldt Current 380, 460, 461, 478, 479 see also Peruvian Current Humboldt Squid 279 Hummingbird, Bee 133 Hump Coral 270 Humpback Angler see Common Blackdevil Humpback Whale 412, 414–15, 420 feeding 200–201 migration 421 song 39, 413 Humphead Parrotfish 160 Green 365 Hunter Ridge 473 Huon Peninsula New Guinea 472 tectonic uplift 102 hurricanes 70–71 Andrew 1992 133 coastal effects 71 development and structure 70 Frances 2004 71 Katrina 2005 72–73 Lili 2002 444 Rita 2005 73 Huso huso 342 Hutia, Cuban 133 Hybrid Remotely Operated Vehicle (HROV) 173 hydrocarbons cold seeps 189 as food source 179, 189 see also gas deposits; oil deposits hydrogen atoms 32 hydrogen bonds 32–33 hydrogen sulphide, hydrothermal vents 188 Hydroid, Stinging 264 Hydrolagus colliei 326 hydrologic cycle 64–65 Hydrothermal Vent Crab 189 hydrothermal vents 34, 185, 188– 189 archaea 232 East Pacific Rise 478 fauna 189 Giant Tube Worm 317 Pompeii Worm 171 hydrozoans 263 Hydrurga leptonyx 409 Hyperoodon ampullatus 417 hyphae 256
I
Iapetus Ocean 46 ice see sea ice ice density 33 fast 198 first-year 198 frazil 198 grease 198 multi-year 198 pack 198 pancake 198 ice ages last 48–49 and sea-level change 48, 88–89 Big Sur 103 Gruinard Bay 96 Ice Coast, Greenland 94 ice lead 199 ice platelets 198 ice rafting 195, 198 ice shelves Antarctic 192–93, 484, 485 breakup 487 satellite monitoring 187, 487 ice sheets 64, 88 Antarctic 48, 482 icebergs 10–11, 194–95, 428 B-15 485 calving 192, 195 detection 195 Labrador Current 435 satellite monitoring 187 Southern Ocean 482 Icefish, Blackfin 365 Iceland Basin 434 icebreakers 199, 428, 485 ichthyosaur 228 Icon Star 310 Iconaster longimanus 310 Idiacanthus antrostomus 349 igneous rocks 44 Iguana, Marine 372, 380, 478 Imitating Flatworm 274 impact crater, Chesapeake Bay 116 Inca Tern 401 Indian Ocean 450, 455, 458–59 2004 tsunami 457 circulation 450, 451, 455 depth 169 ocean floor 450 winds 451 Indian Plate 427, 450, 452, 454, 459 Indo-European Humpback Dolphin 418 Indo-Pacific Crocodile see Saltwater Crocodile Indonesian Coelacanth 342 Indus River 452 Infantfish, Snout 161 ink, octopus defense mechanism 290 Inland Sea 83 insects 294 Inshore Hagfish see Japanese Hagfish Integrated Ocean Drilling Program 43 interference, wave 76 internal waves 76 intertidal habitat 78 Intertidal Rove Beetle 306 inverse estuaries 122 invertebrates 258 Investigator Ridge 455 Iodictyum phoneniceum 307 Ionian Sea 442 ions, in seawater 34 Ipomoea imperati 254 Irish Moss 245 iron banded-iron formation 45 Earth’s core 43 in seawater 35 iron catastrophe 42 Irrawaddy Dolphin 135 irrigation, Murray River 121 Ishigaki Island 160 Isistius brasiliensis 328 island arc formation 50, 466, 469, 470 island chains 51, 460, 477, 480
Istiophorus albicans 369 Ivory Gull 401 Iwo-Jima Ridge 469 Izembek Lagoon 150
J Jabiru Stork 131, 132 Jackass Penguin 387 Jaeger, Arctic 402 Jaeger, Parasitic 402 James Island, Gambia Estuary 120 Jan Mayen Current 431 Jan Mayen Island 431 Japan Basin 464 Japan Trench 464 Japanese Hagfish 323 Japanese Spider Crab 299 Japweed 241 Java Trench 169, 183, 450, 455 Jeffreys Bay 110 Jelly Weed, Small 244 jellyfish 262–63 Jellyfish Box 263, 266 Common, larva 214 Deep-sea 264 Moon 264 Stalked 264 Upsidedown 266 Jewel Anemone 143, 269 jewelry, coral 262 John Dory 355 Johnson Sea-Link submersible 173 Jorunna funebris, and Blue Sponge 261 Juan de Fuca Plate 427, 463 Junceella fragilis 267 Jurassic ocean life 228 plate tectonics 47 Jutland, sand dunes 109 Jutland Bank 436
K Kaburakia excelsa 274 Kallypilidion fascigera 261 Kamchatka Peninsula 464 Kap Hoorn see Cape Horn Kappaphycus cottonii 245 karst Ha Long Bay 102 Krabi Coast 99 katabatic wind 193 Kathetostoma laeve 368 Kattegat 436 Kavachi volcano 472 Keel-billed Toucan 132 Keelworm 143 Kelp Asian 150 Bull 150, 151 Giant 146–47, 151, 240, 242– 43 destruction by Purple Sea Urchin 312 Sea Otters 406 Split-fan 148 Sugar 148 Kelp Anemone 147 Kelp Fly 292, 306 kelp forests 146–47, 148 Kelp Limpet 148 Kemp’s Ridley Turtle 375 Kerala backwaters 121 Kerguelen Hotspot 455 Kerguelen Plateau 482 Kermadec–Tonga Trench 480 keys see cays Kiel Canal 436 Kikori River 135 Kilauea, volcano 40–41, 103, 470 Killer Whale 419 Kinabatangan Mangroves 135 King Penguin 386 King Ragworm 277 King Scallop see Great Scallop Kingfisher Collared 403 Pied 403 Red-breasted Paradise 135 kingfishers 384
index Kings Trough 441 kinorhynchs 315 Kite, Brahminy 397 Kittiwake, Black-legged 401 Klaipeda Strait 119 Klipfish 238 Knotted Wrack 241 Kodiak Seamounts 463 Komoë River 121 Korea Strait 464, 466 Kowloon Peninsula 99 Krabi Coast 99 Krait, Sea, Yellow-lipped 372, 378 Krill Antarctic 199, 293, 297 and water temperature 293 Kurile Harbor Seal 464 Kurile Islands 464 Kurile Trench 464 Kuroshio Current 58, 59, 66, 460, 461, 463, 464, 466, 469 Kuroshio Extension 460, 463 Kwajalein Atoll 161 Kyushu–Palau Ridge 469
L La Niña 69 La Palma, Canary Islands 441 La Plata Dolphin 118 Labrador Current 59, 116, 195, 430, 435 Labroides dimidiatus 365 Labrus mixtus 365 labyrinthulids 256 Labyrinthuloides species 256 Laccadive Islands 452, 459 Ladyfish 343 Laetmogone violacea 314 Lagoa dos Patos 117 lagoons coastal 115 coral reef 152, 154 Laguna de Términos 148 Laguna Madre 117 Laguna San Ignacio 123 Lake Alexandrina 121 Lake Okeechobee 132 Laminaria hyperborea 148 Laminaria ochroleuca 148 Laminaria pallida 148 Laminaria saccharina 148 Laminariales 146, 240 Lamp Shell 317 Lampern 323 Lampetra fluviatilis 323 Lamprey 322 Humber Estuary 119 River see Lampern Sea 323 Lampris guttatus 350 Lancelet 321 anatomy 320 land uplift, and sea-level change 88–89 Landlady’s Wig 240 Langebaan Lagoon 148 Langmuir circulation cells 61 Lanternfish 233 Spotted 349 Lanternshark, Velvet Belly 328 Larosterna inca 401 Larsen Ice Shelf 192, 193, 486, 487 Larus argentatus 400 Larus atricilla 401 Larus marinus 400 Lasaea rubra, in Black Tufted Lichen 257 lateral-line 325, 338 Laticauda colubrina 378 Latimeria chalumnae 342 Latimeria menadoensis 342 Lau Ridge 480 Laughing Gull 401 Laurasia 47 Laurentia 46 Laurentian Fan 435 Laurentian Trough 435 Laurentide Ice Sheet 48, 435 lava basaltic 40–41, 44 sand 112 pillow 185, 460
lava flow Galápagos Islands 21 Hawaii 40–41, 103 Laver 244 laverbread 244 Leach’s Storm Petrel 393 Leaf-scaled Sea Snake 379 Leafy Seadragon 358 Least Auklet 403 Least Tern 126 Leatherback Turtle 113, 375 migration 220 Lemon Shark 325 Lemon Sponge 261 Lena River, discharge into Arctic Ocean 65, 200, 428 Leopard Seal 409 Lepadogaster lepadogaster 354 Lepidochelys kempi 375 Leptonychotes weddell 409 Les Pitons, St. Lucia 95 Lesser Antilles 444 volcanic arc 95 Lessonia variegata 150 Leucetta species 261 levees, New Orleans 73 L’Haridon Bight 111 Lichen 256 Black Tar 257 Black Tufted 257 Gray 257 Yellow Splash 257 Lichina confinis 233 Lichina pygmae 257 life ocean, history 226–229 origin 226 light, wavelength 38–39 Light-mantled Sooty Albatross 390 Lighthouse Reef 156–57 Ligia oceanica 297 Liman Current 150 limestone Amalfi Coast 97 chemical erosion see karst Limey Petticoat 240 Limonium vulgare 254 Limpet Blue-rayed 147, 148 Common 286 Kelp 148 Pear 239 Slipper, sex change 281 limpets, feeding 280 Limpopo River 158 Limulus polyphemus 295 Lined Chiton 291 Lineus longissimus 275 Linnaean hierarchy 206 Linnaeus, Carolus (1707–78) 206 Lionfish 359, 360–61 Red Sea 158, 210 Lithophyllum lichenoides 245 lithosphere 44 Little Bahama Bank 156 Little Egret 394 Little Penguin 387 Littorina littorea 287 Live Sharksucker 364 Lizard, Water Monitor 134 Lizardfish Highfin 177 Reef 349 lizards 372–73 lobe-finned fish 227 see also Coelacanth Lobodon carcinophagus 409 Lobster Caribbean Spiny, migration 220 Common 299 Norway 145 Packhorse 15 Spiny 299 Squat 143, 175, 178, 179 Violet-Spotted Reef 230–31 Loch Carron, biodiversity 211 Lofoten Maelstrom 80 Loggerhead Turtle 374 Loligo vulgaris 291 Lombok, seagrass 149 Lomonsov Ridge 428 Long-finned Pilot Whale 422 Long-legged Spider Crab 302
Long-snouted Spinner Dolphin 418 Long-spined Bullhead 359 Long-spined Sea Urchin 312 Longfin Bannerfish 160, 161 Longnose Sawshark 328 longshore drift 93, 106 Lontra felina 406 Loon, Common 390 loons 384 Lophelia Coral 178, 179, 271 Lophelia pertusa 153, 178, 179, 271 Lophius piscatorius 353 Lord Howe Island 480 Louisiade Archipelago 472 Louisville Ridge 480 Lovely Hatchetfish 349 Low Country, South Carolina 127 luciferin 224 Lugworm 125, 276, 315 Luidia ciliaris 310 Lumpsucker 147, 362 lures, bioluminescent 225 Lutjanus kasmira 363 Lutra lutra 406
M Macaque, Rhesus 134 Macaroni Penguin 387 Mackenzie River delta, discharge into Arctic Ocean 63 Mackerel, Atlantic 369 Mackerel Shark 325 Macquarie Ridge 480 Macrocheira kaempferi 299 Macrocystis pyrifera 240, 312 Macronectes giganteus 392 Macropodia rostrata 302 Madagascar 459 mangroves 134 Madagascar Fish eagle 134 Madagascar Heron 134 Madagascar Teal 134 Madrepora oculata 179 maelstrom 80 maerl 144, 148, 239, 245 Magellan, Ferdinand (c.1480– 1521) 448, 460, 477 Magellanic Flightless Steamer Duck 385 Magellanic Penguin 387 magma 44, 185 magnesium, in seawater 34 magnetite, in cetacean brains 421 Magnificent Feather Duster 277 Majuro Atoll 161 Makarov Basin 428 Malacosteus niger 349 Maldives 159, 452, 459 Maldives Anemonefish 218 Mallotus villosus 347 Malta Plateau 442 Malvinas current 59 mammals 404–405 anatomy and physiology 404 breeding 404 classification 209, 405 conservation 404 exploitation 404 feeding 404 managed retreat 105 Manatee Antillean 132, 405 Florida 133 importance of seagrass 146 West African 422 West Indian 423 Mandarin Fish 339, 368 manganese nodule 182 Mangrove Black 130, 132, 135 Button 130 Red 130, 132 White 130, 132 Mangrove Brittlestar 131 Mangrove Jack 135 Mangrove Kingfisher see Collared Kingfisher Mangrove Monitor 381 mangrove swamps 130–131
biodiversity 131 formation 130 plants 130 mangroves aerial roots 135 Gazi Bay 149 Madagascar 134 New Guinea 136–37 as tsunami protection 134, 457 Manihiki Plateau 477 Manjuari 133 Manta birostris 337 Manta Ray 158, 160, 337 mantle Earth 43 convection cells 43, 44, 46 sampling 43 Manus Trench 472 Marajo Island 118 Marcet, Alexander (1770–1822) 34 Mariana Islands 469 Mariana Trench 169, 171, 183, 469 Marine Otter 406 Marine Skater 294, 306 marine terraces 89, 103 marine-deposition coasts 93 Marquesas Islands 477 Marram Grass 107, 109, 113, 247, 253 Marsh Elder 127 Marsh Harrier 128 Marsh Periwinkle 127 Marsh Samphire see Common Glasswort Marsh Wren 127 Marshall Islands 161, 469 marshes, as tidal barrier 105 Martha’s Vineyard 435 Mascarene Basin 459 Mascarene Plain 459 Mascarene Plateau 459 Mascaret tidal bore 120 mass extinction 228, 229 Mastocarpus stellatus 245 Matagorda Bay 115 Mauna Loa volcano 112, 470 Maupihaa, Society Islands 161 Maupiti, Society Islands 161 Mauritius 459 Mauve Stinger 225, 265 Mawsonite 226 Mayan Cichlid 133 Mediterranean Basin, history 49 Mediterranean Bath Sponge 261 Mediterranean Monk Seal 408 Mediterranean Red Coral 268 jewelry 262 Mediterranean Sea 442–43 depth 169 evolution 49 medusae 262–63 Megachasma pelagios 330 Megalops atlanticus 343 Megamouth Shark 330 Megaptera novaeangliae 412 Meghna delta 134 meiofauna 315 Melanesia 472–73 Melanocetus johnsonii 353 melting, impact, early Earth 42 melting point, water 33 Merganser, Red-breasted 385 Mergus serrator 385 meristem 233 Mermaid’s Wineglass 249 meroplankton 170, 214 Mesozoic climate 48 giant marine reptiles 228 metamorphic rock 44 meteorite impact crater, Chesapeake Bay 116 Meteosat satellite 187 methane cold seeps 189 as food source 179 methane-fixing bacteria 189 Metridium senile 269 microalgae 250 Micronesia 469 Mid-Atlantic Ridge 184, 185, 428, 432, 434, 441, 446
Mid-Indian Ridge 450, 459 mid-ocean ridges 44, 174, 182, 185 creation of oceanic crust 50 and sea-level change 88 Middle America Trench 478 Midway Islands 161, 470 migration 220–21 birds 384 Red Crab 304, 305 tracking 220 vertical 221 Wedge-tailed Shearwater 393 whales 421 Milkfish 341, 346 Milletseed Butterflyfish 161 Minack Theatre 109 Minas Basin 126 minerals hydrothermal vents 188 in seawater 34 Minke Whale 413 Mirim Lagoon 117 Mirounga angustirostris 409 Mississippi Estuary 116 Mitsukurina owstoni 331 mixed estuary 114 Mnemiopsis leidyi 319 moai, Easter Island 479 Moeraki Beach 112 Mohorovicic discontinuity (Moho) 44 Mola mola 371 molecules, water 32–33 mollusks 278–81 anatomy 278 classification 208, 281 feeding 280 life cycles 281 movement 279 reproduction 281 respiration 279 sense organs 279 Molokini Island 51 Monachus monachus 408 Monitor Lizard Mangrove 381 Water 134, 381 Monkey Proboscis 135 Rhesus Macaque 134 Spider 132 Monkfish see Angler Monodon monocerus 417 monoplacophorans 281 monsoon, Indian 54, 450, 454, 473 Monterey Bay 471 kelp forest 151 Monterey Canyon 471 Montevideo 118 Moon formation 42 influence on tides 78–79 Moon Jellyfish 264 Moon Snail 217 Moonfish see Opah Moorea, Society Islands 161 Moray Eel, Chain 344 Morecambe Bay 127 Morelet’s Crocodile 132 Morning-glory, Beach 254 Morus bassanus 395 Mosaic Sea Star 310 mosasaurs 228 Moskenstraumen see Lofoten Maelstrom Moss Golden Dune 251 Saltmarsh 251 Seaside 251 Southern Beach 251 mosses 251 molting, arthropods 293 Mount Desert Island 94 Mount St. Helens, volcanic eruption 184, 463 Mozambique Channel 459 mud bioturbation 315 sea bed 144 Mud Dragon 318 Mud-shrimp, Bay of Fundy 126
499
500
index mudflats 124 Alaskan 129 Guérande 128 Minas Basin 126 Morecambe Bay 127 Saemangeum Wetlands 129 The Wash 128 Wadden Sea 127 see also Common Glasswort Mudskipper 135 Muelleriella crassifolia 251 multi-year ice 198 multihulls, ocean yacht racing 57 Munidopsis serricornis 178 Munk, Walter (born 1917) 39 Murex pecten 286 Murray River 121 Murre, Common 14, 382–83, 402 Mururoa 477 Mushroom Coral 271 Mushroom Leather Coral 266 Mussel Common 282 Ribbed 127 mutualism 217, 294 Myctophum punctatum 349 Myrichthys colubrinus 345 Myripristis vittata 354 Mytilus edulis 282 Myxine glutinosa 323
N Nankai Trough 466 Nansen, Fridjtof (1861–1930) 201 Nansen Fracture Zone 428 Nantucket Island 435 Naruto Whirlpool 83 Narwhal 417 Naso vlamingii 368 Natal Basin 459 Natator depressus 375 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, hurricane monitoring 70 Natterjack Toad 125 Naucrates ductor 364 Nautilus, (US submarine) 199 Nautilus (cephalopod) 35, 290 Nautilus pompilius 290 navigation animal 221 whales 421 Nazca Plate 478, 479 Neanthes virens 277 neap tides 79 nearshore 106 Nebrius ferrugineus 329 Needle Rush 127 Needlefish, Hound 354 Needles Overfalls 82 nekton 165, 214 sunlit zone 170 Neman River, discharge 119 nematodes 315 nemertean worms 275 Nemichthys scolopaceus 344 Neocrinus decorus 313 Neogene, ocean life 228 Neptune Grass 253 Neptune’s Necklace 241 Nereocystis luetkeana 150 neuston 168 New Britain 472 Trench 472 New Caledonia Basin 480 New Georgia Islands 472 New Guinea 472 New Guinea Flightless Rail 135 New Guinea Mangroves 135 New Orleans, Hurricane Katrina 2005 73 New Zealand 480 New Zealand Fur Seal 123 nickel, Earth’s core 43 Nicobar Islands 159 nictating membrane, sharks 325 Niger delta 447 Nile Crocodile 134 Nile Delta, deposition 97 Ninety Mile Beach 111, 112 Ninetyeast Ridge 450, 455
Ningaloo Reef, Whale Sharks 330 Nipponnemertes pulcher 275 nitrates, in seawater 35 nitrogen early Earth 45 in seawater 35 nitrogen-fixing bacteria 233, 247 Nitrosomonas 232 Noctiluca scintillans 236 green algae 250 Noddy, Brown 401 Nodose Box Crab 299 nodule, manganese 182 nori 244 North American Plate 427, 441, 462 North Atlantic Drift 59, 66, 431, 432, 434, 435, 436 Atlantic Conveyor 63 North Equatorial Current 432, 444, 450, 451, 460 North Fiji Basin 473 North Jutland Dunes 109 North Pole 428 North Sea 119, 436 depth 169 North West Passage 430 Northern Bluefin Tuna 369 Northern Bottlenose Whale 417 Northern Fulmar 392 Northern Fur Seal 407 Northern Gannet 382, 384, 395 Northern Harrier 126 Northern Mariana Islands 469 Northern Right Whale 412 Northern Spencer Gulf Estuary 122 Northwest Pacific Basin 464 Norwegian Atlantic Current 429, 436 Norwegian Sea 436 tidal races 80–81 Norwegian Trench 436 notch, wave-cut 93 notosaurs 228 nourishment, beach 105 Novaya Zemlya 431 Nucella lapillus 286 nudibranchs see sea slugs Numenius phaeopus 399 nurseries, kelp forests and seagrass beds 147 Nusa Tenggara 160 nutrients cycle 212 in seawater 35
O O2, in seawater 34, 35 Oarfish 350 Obelia, bioluminescence 224 ocean circulation, polar 200–201 ocean deserts 219 Ocean Explorer ROV 172 ocean floor plate tectonics 50–51 structure 44 ocean gyres 58 Ocean Sunfish 215, 371 ocean temperature satellite monitoring 187 and sea-level 88 ocean trenches 183 ocean warming 192 ocean winds 54–55 ocean yacht racing 56–57 ocean-air interface 168, 214 oceanic crust 44 recycling 50 Oceanites oceanicus 393 Oceanodroma leucorhoa 393 oceanography, satellite 186–87 oceans acidification 67 depth, average 169 depth, satellite estimates 187 evolution 46–49 life, history 226–29 origin 44–45
world 426–27 zones depth 168–71, 219 geographical 218 life 218–19 ocelli 279 Octocoral 175 Octopus Blue-ringed 290 Dumbo 290 Giant 290 Ocypode saratan 303 Odden ice tongue 431 Odobenus rosmarus 407 Odontodactylus scyllarus 297 offshore breezes 55 Ogcocephalus radiutus 352 Oikopleura labradoriensis 321 oil deposits Atlantic Ocean 432 Beaufort Sea 430 continental slope, UN Convention on the Law of the Sea 177 evaporite traps 141 Gulf of Guinea 447 Gulf of Mexico 432, 444 Niger Delta 447 North Sea 432, 436 Persian Gulf 452 Sakhalin Island 464 Sea of Okhotsk 464 sedimentary basins 49 South China Sea 467 Timor Sea 455 Oithona similis 296 Okhotsk Plate 427, 464 Old Harry Rocks 93 Old Sow Whirlpool 80 Olive Sea Snake 379 Oncorhynchus kisutch 348 onshore breezes 55 Ontong Java Rise 472 ooze biogenic 180, 181 calcareous 180, 181 deep sea 223 siliceous 181 Opah 350 Oparin, Aleksandr I. (1894–1980) 226 Ophiothrix fragilis 311 Opisthoproctus soleatus 347 Opsanus tau 351 Orange Fairy Basslet 162–63 Orange Fiddler Crab 303 Orange River 447 Orange Roughy 175, 355 Orange Sea Pen 268 Orchestia gammarella 297 Orcinus orca 419 Orectolobus dasypogon 329 Oregon National Dunes 113 Oresund Bridge 436 Organ Pipe Coral 266 Oscillatoria willei 233 osculum 260 Osmerus eperlanus 347 Osmia aurulenta 306 Osprey 397 Ostracion meleagris 370 Otter European 406 Marine 406 Sea 151, 405, 406 outwash fan 176 overfalls 79, 82 overfishing 350 Cod 212 Sand Eel 403 Owen Fracture Zone 452 Oxycomanthus bennetti 313 oxygen origin 45 in seawater 34, 35 oxygen atoms 32 Oyashio Current 59, 461, 464 Oyster Atlantic Thorny 282 Black-lip Pearl 282 Common, over-exploitation 281 Oyster Plant 247 Oyster Thief 240 Oyster Toadfish 351
Oystercatcher, Eurasian 382, 398 oysters Chesapeake Bay 116 pearl formation 279
P Pachyptila turtur 392 Pacific Angel Shark 328 Pacific Blackdragon 349 Pacific Gray Whale 123, 464 Pacific Grenadier 351 Pacific Hagfish 323 Pacific Halibut 123 Pacific Ocean 460, 469, 470, 471, 477, 478, 479 circulation 460, 461 depth 169 El Niño/La Niña 68–69 Northwestern 464–65 ocean basin 460 Ring of Fire 174, 184, 460, 462 temperature 36 winds 461 Pacific Plate 184, 427, 460, 462, 464, 471, 472, 473, 480 Pacific Razor Clam 129 Pacific Reef Egret 394 Pacific Salmon 463 Pacific Stilt-mangrove 254 Pacific-Antarctic Rise 480 pack ice 198 Packhorse Lobster 15 Paddle Weed 253 Paddle Worm, Green 276 Padina gymnospora 240 Padre Island 117 Paelopatides grisea 223 Pagodroma nivea 392 Pagophila eburnea 401 Pagophilus groenlandicus 408 Pagurus prideaux 269 Painted Ray 335 Pakicetus 228 Palaeo-Tethys Sea 46, 47 Palaeogene, ocean life 228 Palaeomon serratus 298 Palm, Coconut 247, 255 Panama Canal 444, 448 pancake ice 198, 431 Pandion haliaetus 397 Pangea 46, 47 Pantar Island 160 Panthalassic Ocean 46 Panulirus argus 299 Papuan Swiftlet 135 Parablennius gattorugine 368 parallel evolution 47 Parasitic Jaeger 402 parasitism 217, 294 Parazoanthus anguicomus 272 Parrotfish Green Humphead 365 Humphead 160 Passamaquoddy Bay 80 Passion Flower Feather Star 313 Patagonian Ice Sheet 48 Patagonian Ice-fields 103 Patagonian Shelf 449 patch reefs 152 Patella vulgata 286 Patton and Gilbert Seamounts 463 Pea Crab 217, 302 Peacock Mantis Shrimp 297 Peanut Worm 315, 316 Pear Limpet 239 Pearl River Estuary 122 Pearlfish 351 pearls, formation 279 pebbles, beach 107 Pecten maximus 282 pedicellariae, sea urchin 309 Pegea confoederata 321 Pelagia noctiluca 265 pelagic seabirds 382 pelagic zone 164–65 Pelamis platurus 378 Pelecanoides urinatrix 393 Pelecanus occidentalis 395 Pelican Australian, Coorong Lagoon 121 Brown 214, 383, 384, 395
pelicans 384 Penguin Adelie 383 Chinstrap 387 Emperor 190–91, 192–93, 383, 387, 388–89 Galápagos 218 Jackass 387 King 386 Little 387 Macaroni 387 Magellanic 387 Rockhopper 448 penguins 384 Periclemenes brevicarpalis 298 Periclimenes soror 310 peridotite 44 period, wave 76 Periphylla periphylla 264 Periwinkle Common 287 Marsh 127 Persian Gulf 452 Peru–Chile Trench 479 Peruvian Anchoveta 346 Peruvian Current 66, 346, 461 see also Humboldt Current Petrel Bonin 392 Common Diving 393 Leach’s Storm 393 Snow 392 Southern Giant 392 Wilson’s Storm 393 petrels 384 Petrobius maritimus 306 Petrocelis cruenta see Mastocarpus stellatus Petrolisthes lamarckii 299 Petromyzon marinus 323 Phaeophyta 239 Phaethon aethereus 394 Phalacrocorax bougainvillii 396 Phalacrocorax carbo 397 Phalarope, Gray 384, 399 Phalaropus fulicarius 399 Philippine Basin 469 Philippine Plate 466, 469 Philippine Sea 469 Phoca vitulina 408 Phocoena phocoena 422 Phoebastria albatrus 390 Phoebastria nigripes 390 Phoebetria palpebrata 390 Pholas dactylus 283 Phoronis hippocrepia 316 phosphates, in seawater 35 phosphorescence 225 Photoblepharon palpebratum 354 photocytes 224 photophores 38, 224, 233, 291, 348, 349 photosynthesis 38, 250 early Earth 45, 226 oxygen production 35 red and brown seaweed 238–39 sunlit zone 168, 169 Phycodorus eques 358 Phyllospadix 151 Phymatolithon calcareum 245 Physeter macrocephalus 416 phytoplankton 214 at seamounts 174–75 Barents Sea 431 food chain 35, 199, 212, 213 Antarctic Convergence 201 photosynthesis 38 sunlit zone 169–70 surface layer 168 see also diatoms; dinoflagellates; microalgae Pichavaram Mangrove Wetland 134 Pico del Teide volcano 441 Piddock, Common 283 Pied Avocet 398 Pied Kingfisher 403 Piked Dogfish 327 Pilchard, South American 346 pillow lava 185, 460 Pilot Whale, Long-finned 422 Pilotfish 364 Pinch Bug 175 Pinctada margaritifera 282 Pineapplefish 354
index Pink Lace Bryozoan 307 Pink Sands Beach 108 pinnipeds 404–405 early 228 Pinnothere pisum 302 Pipefish Greater 146 Harlequin Ghost 358 Snake 358 piracy, Strait of Malacca 454 Pisonia grandis 255 Piton de la Fournaise 459 placoderms 227 placodonts 228 Plaice 370 plain abyssal 176, 177, 182 sediment 140, 182 planetismals 42 plankton 170, 214, 319 bioluminescent 225 classification 207 see also phytoplankton; zooplankton plankton cycle 164 plants aquatic 247 beach 246 classification 207 coastal 252 dune 247, 252 flowering 146, 252 intertidal 247 marine 246–47 diversity 246 plate tectonics Cambrian 46 Carboniferous 46 Cretaceous 47 Devonian 46 Eocene 47 Jurassic 47 ocean floor 50–51 platelets, ice 198 plates tectonic 46–47, 174, 183, 427 boundaries 50–51 Ring of Fire 184 platforms, wave-cut 89 Plectaster decanus 310 Plectorhinchus chaetodontoides 363 plesiosaurs 228 Pleuronectes platessa 370 Pliny Trench 443 pliosaurs 228 Plotosus lineatus 347 Plover, Gray 398 Plownose Chimera 326 Plumose Anemone 269 plunge divers (sea birds) 382–83, 395 plunging breakers 77 see also barrel waves, tube waves Pluvialis squatorola 398 pneumatophore 130 pocket beach 109, 112 Pockington Trough 472 Pogonophoran Worm 317 Polar Bear 25, 199, 406 threat of global warming 91 polar cells 54 polar easterlies 54, 429 Polka-dot Batfish 352 Pollicipes polymerus 296 pollution Chesapeake Bay 116 coastal 141 coral reefs 153, 155, 156 Curoman Lagoon 119 Ebrié Lagoon 121 effect on Yellow Splash Lichen 257 Exxon Valdez oil spillage 463 Klaipeda Strait 119 New Guinea mangroves 135 Nusa Tenggara 160 Pearl River Estuary 122 Venetian Lagoon 120 Polybranchid 288 polychaetes 276 Polynesia 477 polynyas 199 Polyprion americanus 362 polyps, reef-building coral 153, 262
Pompeii Worm 171, 277 Poor Knights Islands 150 Poppy, Yellow Horned 254 Porcelain Crab 293, 299, 300– 301 Porcupinefish 371 Porites lobata 270 pororoca tidal bore 118 Porphyra dioica 244 Porphyra purpurea 244 Porpita porpita 264 Porpoise, Harbor 422 Port Jackson Shark 329 Porthcurno Beach 109 Portuguese Man-of-War 214, 258 Portunus pelagicus 303 Posidonia australis 150 Posidonia oceanica 253 post-glacial rebound 88, 96 Postelsia palmaeformis 240 potassium, in seawater 34 Potato Grouper 362 Precambrian, ocean life 226 precipitation 64–65 predators, top 212 Predatory Comb Jelly 319 pressure underwater 37, 171 deep-sea animals 171, 222 pressure-system winds 55 effect of El Niño/La Niña 68– 69 prevailing winds 54, 58 Priapula Worm 316 Priapulus caudatus 316 Prickly Redfish 314 primary consumers 212 primary producers 212 Prince William Sound 463 Prion, Fairy 392 Prionace glauca 334 Pristiophorus cirratus 328 Pristis pectinata 335 Pro-Form racing yacht 57 Proboscis Monkey 135 Prochloron, symbiosis with Colonian Sea Squirt 321 producers, primary 212 productivity 213 Prosqualodon davidi 228 Prostheceraeus vittatus 273 Protector Shoal 449 protists 207, 214, 234 Protoperidinium depressum 236 protoplanetary disc 42 Pseudanthias squamipinnis 362 Pseudobiceros bedfordi 274 Pseudoceros dimidiatus 274 Pseudoceros imitatus 274 Pseudocolochirus tricolor 314 Pterobranch Worm 316 Pterodroma hypoleuca 392 Pterois volitans 359, 360–61 pteropods 180, 181 pterosaurs 228 Ptilometra australis 313 Ptilosarcus gurneyi 268 Puerto Rico Trench 169, 183, 432 Pufferfish, Star 371 Puffin, Atlantic 403 Puffinus gravis 393 Puffinus tenuirostris 393 Puget Sound, glaciation 102 Punalu’u Beach 112 Punta Patiño Nature Reserve 135 Puperita pupa 286 Purple Sea Fan 156 Purple Sea Urchin 312 Pusa hispida 408 Pygmy Seahorse 359 Pygoscelis antarctica 387 Pyrenocollema halodytes 257 Pyrosoma spinosum 321 Pyrosome, Giant 258, 321 Pyura spinifera 321
Q quartz 44 shocked 116 quaternary consumers 212 Queen Angelfish 154, 363
Queen Scallop 140 quicksand Alaskan mudflats 129 Morecambe Bay 127 QuikScat satellite 54, 187
R Rabaul caldera, New Britain 472 Rabbit Fish 326 racing, ocean yacht 56–57 Radarsat satellite 187 radioactive decay 42 radiolarians 181, 237 radula 280 rafting, ice 195, 198 Ragged Tooth Shark see Sand Tiger Shark Ragworm, King 277 ragworms 217 Rai’atea, Society Islands 161 Rail Clapper 127 Flightless 158 Zapata 133 rainbands 70 rainfall 64 raised beach 89, 96 Raja undulata 335 Ramalina siliquosa 257 Rapa Nui see Easter Island Rarotonga 477 Ratfish, Spotted 326 Rathlin Island 81 Ray Eagle 158, 160, 204 Manta 158, 160, 337 Painted 335 Spotted Eagle 337 rays anatomy 22–23, 324 reproduction 325 Razor Shell 283 Razorfish 359 rebound, post-glacial 88, 96 Recurvirostra avosetta 398 recycling, nutrient 212 Red Abalone 286 Red Bandfish 363 Red Coral, Mediterranean 268 Red Crab, migration 304, 305 Red Mangrove 130, 132 Red Phalarope see Gray Phalarope Red Sea 452 coral reefs 158 Red Sea Fault Coast 98 Red Sea Lionfish 158, 210 red seaweeds 238–39 red tide toxin 164, 236, 237 Red-billed Brush-turkey 135 Red-billed Tropicbird 394 Red-breasted Merganser 385 Red-breasted Paradise Kingfisher 135 Reddish Egret 132 Redfish Laguna Madre 117 Prickly 314 reef crest 154–55 reef flat 154, 155 Reef Hermit Crab 299 Reef Lizardfish 349 reef zones 154–55 Reef-forming Sponge 260 reefs coral 152–55 biodiversity 154–55 cold-water 179 destruction 155, 160 formation 153 warm-water 153 zones 154–55 reflective beach 106, 107 refraction, wave 77 Regalecus glesne 350 Regan’s Angler 353 Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) 173 Ocean Explorer 172 reproduction, animals 259 reptiles 372–73 anatomy 372 classification 209, 373
exploitation 372 feeding 372 giant, Mesozoic 228 habitat 372 reproduction 373 residence time, ion 34 Reticulate Whipray 335 retreat, managed 105 Réunion, hotspot 51, 459 Reykjanes Ridge 434 Rhabdopleura compacta 316 Rheic Ocean 46 Rhesus Macaque 134 Rhinobatos lentiginosus 335 Rhinochimaera pacifica 326 Rhinocodon typus 330 Rhinomuraena quaesita 344 rhinophores 288 rhizoids 251 Rhizophora stylosa 254 Rhodophyta 239 Rhodothamniella floridula 244 rias 88 Devon Coast 96 Falmouth Bay 148 Tasmania 88 Ribbed Mussel 127 Ribbon Eel 344 Ribbon Worm 275 ridges mid-ocean 44, 174, 182, 185 and sea-level change 88 ridging, ice 198 Rift Shrimp 189 Riftia pachyptila 317 rifting 46–47 Red Sea 46, 98 Right Whale 412 Southern, migration 421 Riiser–Larsen Ice Shelf 192–93 Ring of Fire, Pacific Ocean 174, 184, 460, 462 Ring-tailed Cardinal Fish 363 Ringed Seal 408 Rio de la Plata 118 Rio Jacui 117 rip currents 110 ripples 76 rise, continental 177 Rissa tridactyla 401 Risso’s Dolphin 418 River Lamprey see Lampern rivers Amazon 118, 444, 65 Ambodibonara 134 Brahmaputra 134, 454 Changjiang see Yangtze Chao Phraya 467 Coleroon Estuary 134 Congo 114, 447 Danube 443 Digul 135 Dordogne 120 Gambia 120 Garonne 120 Ganges 134, 177, 454 Huang He see Yellow River Humber 119 Indus 452 Kikori 135 Komoë Lena 65, 200, 428 Limpopo 158 Mackenzie 63 Mississippi 116 Murray 121 Neman 119 Niger 447 Nile 97 Orange 447 Ouse 119 Paraná 118 Pearl 122 Plate Estuary 118 St. Lawrence 116, 435 Scheldt 104, 119 Susquehanna 116 Trent 119 Uruguay 118 Vellar 134 Xi Jiang 122 Yangtze 122, 466 Yellow 466 Roaring Forties 54 Robber Crab 158, 299
Rock Springtail 306 Rocket, Sea 246 Rockhopper Penguin 448 Rockling, Shore 351 rocks formation 44 igneous 44 metamorphic 44 sea bed 142–43 sedimentary 44 Rodinia 46, 227 Rodrigues Ridge 459 rogue waves 76 Ronne–Filchner Ice Shelf 192 rorquals 413 Roseate Spoonbill 132 Ross, Sir James Clark (1800–62) 192, 485 Ross Ice Shelf 192, 485 Ross Sea 485 rotifers 319 Roughy, Orange 175, 355 Round Stingray 336 Roundworm 316 ROV see Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) Ruddy Turnstone 399 Ruppia maritima 148 Rynchops niger 402 Ryukyu Islands 466 Ryukyu Trench 466, 469
S Saba Bank, biodiversity 211 Sabellaria alveolata 277 Sabellastarte magnifica 277 Sablefish 176 saccoglossans 249 Saccopharynx lavenbergi 345 Saccorhiza polyschides 148 Sacculina 217, 292 Saemangeum Wetlands 129 Saffir–Simpson scale (hurricane categories) 71 Saguenay Fjord 116 Sahul land bridge 48 Sailfish, Atlantic 369 sailing long-haul 55 ocean yacht racing 56–57 Sailor’s Eyeball 249 St. Helena 185, 446 St. Lawrence Estuary 116, 435 St. Lawrence Seaway 435 St. Lucia, Les Pitons 95 St. Ninian’s Tombolo 108 Sakhalin Island 464 Saldanha Bay 148 Salicornia europaea 253 salinity 37 Arctic Ocean 65 Baltic Sea 436 Black Sea 443 Coorong Lagoon 121 Dead Sea 37 early oceans 45 Eastern Mediterranean 442 epicontinental seas 47 and freezing point of seawater 37 Gulf of Mexico 444 Gulf of Thailand 467 inverse estuary 122 Laguna de Términos 148 under ice shelves 193 and underwater circulation 60 see also salt, in seawater Salmo salar 348 salmon 341 Atlantic 348 Coho 348 migration 220 Pacific 463 salmon farming 338, 348 Salp 321 salt in seawater 34, 37 see also salinity salt harvesting, Guérande 128 Salt Marsh Moss 251 salt marshes 124–25 Bay of Fundy 124 biodiversity 125
501
502
index Cape Cod 126 conservation 125 fauna 125 formation 124 Guérande 128 Minas Basin 126 Morecambe Bay 127 Saemangeum Wetlands 129 South Carolina Low Country 127 the Wash 128 Wadden Sea 127 zones 124 salt pans, Guérande 128 salt-wedge estuary 114, 116, 118 saltation 107 Saltenfjord 81 Saltmeadow Cordgrass 126 Saltstraumen, tidal race 81 saltwater, global 64 Saltwater Crocodile 135,136–37, 373, 381 Salvelinus alpinus 348 Samphire, Marsh see Common Glasswort San Andreas Fault 123, 471 San Francisco Bay 123, 471 influence of California Current 67, 471 tide rip 82 San Pablo Bay 123 sand beach 107 black volcanic 112 sea bed 144 sand belt, Nile Delta 97 Sand Bubbler Crab 292 Sand Crocus 246 Sand Dollar 312 sand dollars 308 sand dunes 107 Banc d’Arguin 110 Cap Ferret 110 Curonian Spit 119 destabilization 113 Ninety Mile Beach 112 North Jutland 109 Oregon National Dunes 113 Skeleton Coast 98 stabilization 105 see also Marram Grass Sand Eel 368 commercial fisheries 165, 357, 403 Sand Hopper 297 sand scour 143 sand spits 93, 108, 110 Dungeness Spit 113 Sand Tiger Shark 330 Sand Weed 244 sandflats 124 Minas Basin 126 Sandpiper Semipalmated 126 Spoon-billed 129 Santorini 443 Sarawat mountain escarpment 98 Sarcophyton trocheliophorum 266 Sardinops sagax 346 Sargasso Sea 170, 444 European Eel 344 Sargassum, Brown 238 Sargassum muticum 241 Sargassum natans 238 Sargassumfish 170, 215, 353 sastrugi 193 satellite oceanography 186, 187 Envisat 187 Meteosat 187 QuikScat 187 Radarsat 187 Saury, Atlantic 354 Sawfish, Smalltooth 335 Sawshark 325 Longnose 328 scales, fish 338 Scallop Great 282 Queen 140 Scalloped Hammerhead Shark 334 Scandinavian Ice Sheet 48 Scarba 81 scatterometer 54, 187 scavengers, deep-sea 182, 223 scavenging, Herring Gull 400
Schistidium maritimum 251 Scilly Isles, influence of North Atlantic Drift 63 sclerites 262 Scomber scombrus 369 Scomberesox saurus 354 Scorpaena plumieri 362 Scorpionfish 216 Spotted 362 Scotia Arc 449 Scotia Plate 427, 448, 449 Scotia Sea 448, 449 scour, sand 143 Scrawled Filefish 370 scrimshaw 405 Scurvy-grass 254 Scyliorhinus retifer 331 sea anemones, anatomy 262 Sea Apple 314 sea arch 92 Sea of Azov 443 Sea Bamboo 148 sea bed rocky 142–43 sandy 144–45 Sea Butterfly see Three-tooth Cavoline sea cave 93 sea color 39 Sea of Cortez see Gulf of California Sea Cow see Manatee Sea Cow, Steller’s 423 Sea Cucumber 144, 181, 223, 314 sea cucumbers 308 sea daisies 308 Sea Eagle, White-bellied 397 Sea Fan Common 267 Purple 156 “sea gliders” 187 Sea Goldie 152–53, 362 Sea Grapes 249 Sea Hare 288 Sea Ivory 257 Sea of Japan/East Sea 150, 464 sea knolls 174 Sea Krait, Yellow-lipped 372, 378 Sea Lamprey 323 Sea Lavender 124 Common 254 Sea Lettuce 248 sea lilies 308 Sea Lily 223, 313 Sea Lion California 407 South American, breeding colonies 405 sea lions, anatomy and physiology 404 Sea of Marmara 443 Sea Mayweed 247 Sea Mouse 144, 276 Sea of Okhotsk 464 Sea Otter 151, 405, 406 Sea Oxeye 127 Sea Palm 240 Sea Pen 144 Orange 268 Slender 268 Sea Pink 252 Sea Potato 313 Sea Rocket 246 sea skaters 32 Sea Slater 297 Sea Slug Chromodorid 288 Hermissenda 288 sea slugs 249, 279 sea smoke 59 Sea Snake Beaked 378 Leaf-scaled 379 Olive 379 Turtle-headed 379 Yellow-bellied 378 sea snakes 372–73 Sea Sparkle 236 Sea Spider, Giant 295 sea spiders 294 Sea Squirt Colonial 321 Common 320 Star 321
sea stack 93 Marinha Beach 97 Twelve Apostles 20, 99 sea stars 308 Sea Strawberry 108 Sea Tulip 321 Sea Urchin Edible 312 Long-spined 312 Purple 312 sea urchins 142, 308, 312–313 control by Sea Otter 151 sea walls 105 Sea Whip, White 267 sea ice 33, 198–99, 434, 449 Arctic Ocean 63 Atlantic Conveyor 63 cycle 65 Greenland Sea 431 Northwestern Pacific 464 satellite monitoring 187 Southern Ocean 482 sea-level change 49, 88–89 Acadia National Park 94 Big Sur 103 geological past 89 Gruinard Bay 96 rise Bangladesh 91 global warming 91 Pacific islands 91 southeastern US 91 see also tides Sea-star Shrimp 310 seabirds anatomy 382 breeding 384 classification 384 feeding 383 habitat 382 migration 384 threat from fishing 383 seafloor spreading 47 and sea-level change 49 seagrass 146, 247, 252 Gazi Bay 149 Laguna de Términos 148 Lombok 149 meadows 117, 146–47 Monteray Bay 151 Shark Bay 150 seahorse camouflage 135 Pygmy 359 Short-snouted 358 Seal Antarctic Fur 407 Common 408 Crabeater 409 Elephant 37, 61, 222 Northern 409 Gray 119, 408, 410–11 Harbor see Seal, Common Harp 408 Kurile Harbor 464 Leopard 409 Mediterranean Monk 408 New Zealand Fur 123 Northern Fur 407 Ringed 408 South American Fur 407 Weddell 199, 222, 409 seal hunting 430 seals, anatomy and physiology 404 seamounts 174–75 at divergent plate boundaries 50 Bermuda Platform 156 biodiversity 211 Emperor, Hawaii 470 Gulf of Alaska 463 Pacific Ocean 469 seas, epicontinental 47 Seaside Moss 251 Seasnail, Violet 214, 258 seawater chemistry 34–35 density 37 freezing point 198 effect of salinity 37 gases 35 ions 34 nutrients 35
pressure 37 salinity 37 temperature 36 Seaweed Cotton’s 245 Flaccid Green 248 Spectacular 245 seaweed zone 142 seaweeds green 247, 248 anatomy 248 habitat 248 harvesting 151, 238 see also agar gel; alginate extraction red and brown 238–39, 247 anatomy 238 classification 239 distribution 238 habitat 238 life strategies 239 secondary consumers 212 sediment biogenic 180, 181 Black Sea 443 continental rise 177 continental shelf 144–45 continental slope 176 deep-sea 180 deposition, Nile Delta 97 Humber Estuary 119 mangrove swamps 133, 134 mixed 144 ocean floor 180–81 terrigenous 180 Tigris-Euphrates Delta 99 see also mud; sand; silt sediment plain 140, 182 sediment predators 140 sedimentary basins 49 oil deposits 49 sedimentary rock 44 seeps, cold 189 seismic monitoring 51 Semibalanus balanoides 296 semidiurnal tides 78 Semipalmated Sandpiper 126 Seneca the Younger, hydrologic cycle 65 Sepia apama 291 Sergeant Major 364 Serpent Star 311 Seven Arm Starfish 310 Sewell Rise 454 Seychelles 459 Seychelles Bank 459 Shad, Allis 346 Shark Basking 170, 330 Blue 334 Bluntnose Sixgill 327 Caribbean Reef 229 Cookie Cutter 328 Copper 213 Frilled 327 Goblin 331 Gray Nurse see Shark, Sand Tiger Gray Reef 229 Greenland 328 Hammerhead 324–25 Lemon 325 Megamouth 330 Pacific Angel 328 Port Jackson 329 Ragged Tooth see Shark, Sand Tiger Sand Tiger 330 Scalloped Hammerhead 334 Sharpnose Sevengill 327 Tawny Nurse 329 Tiger 334 Whale 258, 330 White 331, 332–33 Whitetip Reef 334 Zebra 329 Shark Bay, Western Australia 111, 150 sharks anatomy 324 attacks on humans 110, 331 classification 325 conservation 324 hunting senses 325 reproduction 325
Sharpnose Sevengill Shark 327 Shearwater Great 393 Short-tailed 393 Wedge-tailed, migration 393 Sheathbill, Snowy 398 Shelduck, Common 385 shelf continental 140–41 geology 141 shelf break 176 Shell Beach, Shark Bay 111 shells, beach 107 Shikoku Island 83 Shinkai submersible 168 Shipworm 282 shipwrecks diving 475 as habitat 145 Skeleton Coast 98 Shiraho Reef 160 shoaling fish 258, 340 waves 77 shocked quartz 116 Shore Bristletail 306 Shore Clingfish 354 Shore Rockling 351 Short-snouted Seahorse 358 Short-tailed Albatross 390 Short-tailed Shearwater 393 Shrimp Anemone 12–13, 298 Banded Coral 217 Common 298 Deep Sea Red 298 Giant Mussel 297 Harlequin, molting 293 Peacock Mantis 297 Rift 189 Sea-star 310 Spotted Cleaner 292 Tozeuma 149 shrimp farming 131, 298, 467 shuga 198 Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve 132 Siberian Ice Sheet 48 Siboglinum ekmani 317 Sicily 442 silica 181 hydrothermal vents 188 in sponges 260 siliceous ooze 181 silt 180 Alaskan mudflats 129 Plate River estuary 118 Yangtze Estuary 122 see also sediment Silurian, ocean life 227 Singapore Harbor 92 sink carbon 35, 67 ion 34 sinkhole, Great Blue Hole 157 Siphonaria compressa 148 sirenians 404–405 early 228 Skagerrak 436 phytoplankton bloom 35 Skate, Common 335 Skater, Marine 294, 306 skates 325 Skeleton Coast 98, 100–101, 447 Skiathos Island 443 Skimmer, Black 402 Skjerstadfjord 81 Skookumchuck Narrows Tidal Race 82 Skua Arctic 402 Great 402 Sleeper Shark 325 Slender Sea Pen 268 Slender Snipe Eel 344 Slipper Limpet, sex change 281 Sloane’s Viperfish 348 slope, continental 176 Slough-na-more Tidal Race 81 Smalltooth Sawfish 335 Smelt 341, 347 smokers black 188 white 188 Smooth Cordgrass 124, 126, 127
index Snake Eel, Banded 345 Snake Pipefish 358 Snapper, Bluestripe 161, 363 Snout Infantfish 161 Snow Petrel 392 snowball events 48 snowfall 64 Snowy Sheathbill 398 Society Islands 161 sodium chloride 34 sodium ions 34 Sodwana Bay, continental slope 176 SOFAR channel 39 solar heating 54, 66 Solar System, early 42 Soldierfish, Whitetip 354 Solea solea 370 solenogasters 281 Solenosmilia variabilis 179 Solenostomus paradoxus 358 solid-state creep 43 Solomon Islands 472, 473 Solomon Sea 472 Microplate 472 Somali Current 450, 451 Somateria mollissima 385 Somniosus microcephalus 328 Sooty Albatross 390 Light-mantled 390 Sooty Tern 184 Soufrière Volcano, Monserrat 444 sound, underwater 39 Sound of Barra 148 Sound Fixing and Ranging channel (SOFAR) 39 Sousa chinensis 418 South American Fur Seal 407 South American Pilchard 346 South American Plate 427, 446, 448, 479 South American Sea Lion, breeding colonies 405 South Atlantic Gyre 432 South Atlantic Plate 449 South Carolina Low Country 127 South China Basin 467 South China Sea 467 South Equatorial Current 446, 450, 451, 455, 459, 460, 473, 477, 479 South Georgia 448, 449 South Georgia Ridge 449 South Indian Gyre 450 South Orkney Islands 448 South Pacific Gyre 477, 479 South Sandwich Islands 448, 449 South Sandwich microplate 449 South Sandwich Trench 183, 432, 449 South Scotia Ridge 449 South Shetland Islands 448 Southeast Indian Ridge 450 Southeast Monsoon 461 Southern Beach Moss 251 Southern Giant Petrel 392 Southern Ocean 482 circulation 201, 482, 483 depth 169 icebergs 195 ocean floor 482 winds 482, 483 yacht racing 57 Southern Right Whale 412 migration 421 Southern Stingray 336–37 Southwest Indian Ridge 450 Southwest Monsoon 450, 451 Southwest Pacific Basin 480 Spanish Dancer 289 specific heat capacity 33 Spectacular Seaweed 245 Spencer Gulf 122 Sperm Whale 222, 416 spermaceti 416 Spheniscus demersus 387 Spheniscus magellanicus 387 Sphyraena barracuda 369 Sphyrna lewini 334 Spider Monkey 132 spilling breakers 77 Spiny Lobster 299 Caribbean, migration 220 Spiny-headed Blenny 16–17
Spirobranchus giganteus 277 spits, sand 93, 108, 110, 113 Spitzbergen 33 split-fan kelp 148 Spondylus americanus 282 Sponge Barrel 260 Blue 261 Boring 217 Breadcrumb 261 Coralline 261 Lemon 261 Mediterranean Bath 261 Reef-forming 260 Tube 154, 261 sponges 260–61 anatomy 260 Spongia officinalis 261 Spookfish 326 Brownsnout 171 Spoon-billed Sandpiper 129 Spoonbill, Roseate 132 Spoonworm 315, 316 sporangia 251 Spotted Boxfish 370 Spotted Cleaner Shrimp 292 Spotted Cusk-eel 351 Spotted Eagle Ray 337 Spotted Garden Eel 345 Spotted Lanternfish 349 Spotted Ratfish 326 Spotted Reef Crab 302 Spotted Scorpionfish 362 Spratly Islands 467 spreading, seafloor 47 Spriggina 226 spring tides 79 Springtail 292 Rock 306 Spurdog see Piked Dogfish Squalus acanthias 327 Squat Lobster 143, 175, 178, 179 Squatina californica 328 Squid Bigfin Reef 171, 281 Common 291 Firefly 38, 224 Glass 291 Humboldt 279 Vampire 291 stack see sea stack Stalked Jellyfish 264 standing waves 79, 82 Star Pufferfish 371 Star Sea Squirt 321 starfish 308 Crown of Thorns 158, 161, 309, 311 Goosefoot 310 Seven Arm 310 Stargazer, Common 368 statocyst 319 Steamer Duck, Magellanic Flightless 385 Stegostoma fasciatum 329 Steller’s Sea Cow 423 Stenella longirostris 418 Stercorarius parasiticus 402 Stercorarius skua 402 Sterna caspia 401 Stickleback, Three-spined 359 Stilt, Black-winged 398 stilt fishing 357 Stilt-mangrove, Pacific 254 Stinger, Mauve 225, 265 stinging cells 262 Stinging Hydroid 264 Stingray Blue-spotted 336 Round 336 Southern 144–45, 336–37 “stingray city” 337 Stonefish 142, 359 stony coral 153, 158 Stoplight Loosejaw 349 Stork Jabiru 131, 132 Wood 132 storm tropical 70–71 see also hurricanes storm beach, Chesil Beach 109 Storm Petrel Leach’s 393 Wilson’s 393
storm surge 71 storm-surge barriers 105 Eastern Scheldt Estuary 104, 119 Strait of Dover 437 Strait of Gibraltar 442 Strait of Hormuz 452 Strait of Magellan 448 Strait of Malacca 454 Strait of Messina 82, 442 Strait of Sicily 442 Straits of Florida 444 Straits of Gibraltar, closure 49 stratification, water, Hardanger Fjord 119 Striped Catfish 258, 347 stromatolites 150, 226, 232 Strombidium sulcatum 237 Stromboli 442 Strongylocentrotus purpuratus 312 Sturgeon Beluga 342 European 342 sturgeons 341 Gironde Estuary 120 subduction 46, 50, 183 subduction zone Aleutian Trench 462 Andaman Sea 454 Cascade Range 463 Coral Sea 473 Hikurangi Trench 480 Java Trench 455 Kermadec–Tonga Trench 480 Lesser Antilles volcanic island arc 95 Middle America Trench 478 Northwestern Pacific 464 Pacific Ocean 460 Peru–Chile Trench 479 Philippine Trench 469 Ryukyu Trench 466, 469 South Sandwich Trench 449 Vityaz Trench 473 submarine canyon 176 submarine waterfall 182 submersibles 173 Alvin 168, 171, 173, 182–83 Deep Flight Aviator 173 Deep Rover 223 Johnson Sea-Link 173 Shinkai 168, 173 Trieste expedition 168, 183 see also Remotely Operated Vehicle subsidence, and sea-level change 88 Suez Canal 452 sugar kelp 148 Suisun Bay, San Francisco 123 Sula leucogaster 395 Sula nebouxii 395 sulphate, in seawater 34 sulphides, hydrothermal vents 188 Sulu Sea 160, 467 Sun early Solar System 42 influence on tides 79 Sunda land bridge 48 Sunda Plate 454 Sunda Shelf 467 Sunda Strait 467 Sunda Trench 450, 454, 455 Sundarbans Mangrove Forest 134 Sunfish, Ocean 215, 371 sunlight 38 sunlit zone 168, 169–70, 219 supercontinents 46 Supertubes, Jeffreys Bay 110 surf zone 106 surf-kayaking 82 surface currents 58–59 surface layer 168 surface tension 32, 33 surfing 77 Jeffreys Bay 110 Tamarindo Beach 113 Surtsey Island 185, 434 Susquehanna River 116 Svalbard 431 Swallow-tailed Gull 400 swamps, mangrove 130–31 swash zone 106 swash-aligned beach 106
swell 76 Swiftlet, Papuan 135 swimbladder 258, 339 Sydney-to-Hobart Race 57 Symbion pandora 318 symbiosis benthos 217 Colonial Sea Squirt 321 Giant Clam 283 green algae 250 Synanceia verrucosa 359 Synchiropus splendidus 368 Synodus variegatus 349 Syntrichia ruraliformis 251 Syringodium filiforme 148
T Table Coral 270 Tachyeres pteneres 385 Tadorna tadorna 385 Taeniura lymma 336 Tahiti 161 Taiwan Strait 466, 467 Tamarindo Beach 113 Tapeworm, Broad Fish 274 Tarpon 343 Tasman, Abel (1603–c.1659) 480 Tasman Sea 480 Tasseled Wobbegong 329 tasselweed 148 Taurulus bubalis 359 Tawny Nurse Shark 329 Taylor Column 174 Teal, Madagascar 134 tectonic estuary 123 tectonic plates 46, 174, 183, 427 boundaries 50–51 ocean floor 50–51 Ring of Fire 184 tectonic uplift, Big Sur 103 temperature ocean 36 effect of El Niño/La Niña 68–69 monitoring 69 satellite monitoring 187 and sea-level 88 and underwater circulation 60 water 33 Tenerife Island 441 Tephromela atra 257 Terceira Rift 441 Terebratulina septentrionalis 317 Teredo navilis 282 Tern Arctic, migration 220 Caspian 401 Common 128 Fairy see Tern, White Inca 401 Least 126 Sooty 184 White 401 terraces, marine 89, 103 Terrapin, Diamond-backed 126 terrigenous sediment 180 Terrington Marshes 128 tertiary consumers 212 Tethys Ocean 47, 442, 443 see also Palaeo-Tethys Sea Tetraselmis convolutae 250 Teuthowenia pellucida 291 Thalassarche melanophrys 391 Thalassia testudinum 148 Thalassiosira nordenskioeldii 235 Thalassodendron ciliatum 149 Thelenota ananas 314 thermocline 36 thermohaline processes 60 Three Gorges Dam 122 Three-spined Stickleback 359 Three-tooth Cavoline 288 Thunnus thynnus 369 Thysanoon Flatworm 274 Thysanozoon nigropapillosum 274 Tiagba village, Ivory Coast 121 tidal barriers 105 tidal bores Mascaret 120 pororoca 118 tidal currents 79 tidal flats 124 Alaskan 129
Minas Basin 126 Morecambe Bay 127 Saemangeum Wetlands 129 South Carolina Low Country 127 The Wash 128 Wadden Sea 127 Yatsu-Higata 129 tidal power 432 tidal races 79, 80–83 tide rip 79, 82 tides 76, 78–79 diurnal 78 monthly cycle 79 neap 79 semidiurnal 78 spring 79 see also waves, ocean Tierra del Fuego 448 Tiger, Bengal 134 Tiger Cowrie 287 Tiger Shark 334 Tigris-Euphrates Delta 99 Tiktaalik roseae 227 Timor Sea 455 oil deposits 455 Timor Trough 455 Titan Triggerfish 370 predator of Long-spined Sea Urchin 312 Titanic disaster 196, 197, 435 Toad, Natterjack 125 Toadfish, Oyster 351 Todirhamphus chloris 403 Tokyo Bay, Yatsu-Higata tidal flat 129 tombolo (sand spit) 106, 108, 109 Tompot Blenny 368 Tonga Ridge 480 Tonga Trench 477 Tonicella lineata 291 top predators 212 Top Shell 286 Torpedo nobiliana 336 Torres Strait 473 Torsk 351 Toucan, Keel-billed 132 tourism diving 475 Lombok 149 Red Sea 158, 475 Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve 132 toxin, red tide toxin 236, 237 Toxopneustes pileoulus 312 Tozeuma Shrimp 149 Trachinus draco 368 trade winds 54, 432, 451, 461 transform faults 446 Easter Island Fracture Zone 479 transform plate boundary 50 Transpolar Current 200, 201, 428, 429 trawling, damage to deep-water reefs 179 trenches, ocean 50, 183 Triaenodon obesus 334 Triassic, ocean life 228 Trichechus manatus 423 Trichechus senegalensis 422 Trichodesmium erythraeum 233 trichomes 233 Tridacna gigas 283 Trieste expedition 168, 183, 469 Triggerfish Titan 370 predator of Long-spined Sea Urchin 312 trilobites 227 trimarans, ocean yacht racing 57 triple junction Azores 441 Gulf of Guinea 447 Indian Ocean 450 Tripodfish 223, 349 Trisopterus luscus 350 Tristan da Cunha 185 seaweed evolution 238 trochophore, ciliated 281 Trochus niloticus 286 Tropical Feather Star 313 Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission 187 Tropicbird, Red-billed 394
503
504
index Trottoir Coralline 245 Trumpetfish 358 tsunamis 51 2004 Indian Ocean 51, 134, 159, 454, 456, 457 Peru–Chile Trench 479 risk, La Palma Island 441 warning systems 51, 457 Tsushima Basin 464 Tsushima Current 150, 466 Tuamotu Islands 477 Tubbataha Reefs 160 Tube Anemone 177, 272 tube feet 308, 310 Tube Sponge 154, 261 Tube Worm, Giant 317 tube-riding 77, 110 Tubeworm, Vent 189 Tubipora musica 266 Tubulanus annulatus 275 Tuna, Northern Bluefin 369 tunicates, anatomy 320 Tunisian Plateau 442 Turbanella species 318 turbidity currents 176, 435 Turkeyfish see Lionfish Turnstone, Ruddy 399 Tursiops truncatus 418 Turtle Eastern Box 126 Flatback 375 Green 112, 158, 374 importance of seagrass 146 Hawksbill 158, 374, 376–77, 474 hazard from fishing 357 Kemp’s Ridley 375 Leatherback 113, 375 migration 220 Loggerhead 374 Turtle-headed Sea Snake 379 turtles 372–73 tusk shells 281 Twelve Apostles sea stacks 20, 99 twilight zone 168, 170, 219 Tylosaurus crocodiles 354 typhoons 70–71 East China Sea 466 Philippine Sea 469 see also hurricanes Tyrrhenian Sea 442
U Uca vocans 303 Ulothrix flacca 248 Ulva lactuca 248 Unicornfish, Bignose 368 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea 177 uplift land 88–89 tectonic Big Sur 103 Huon Peninsula 102 Upside-down Jellyfish 266 upwelling 60 nutrient 35, 60, 213 at seamounts 174 effect of El Niño/La Niña 68–69 St. Lawrence Estuary 116 Peru–Chile Trench 479 Urchin, Flower 312 urchins sea 142, 312–13 control by Sea Otter 151 Uria aalge 402 Urolophus halleri 336 Ursus maritimus 406 Urticinopsis antarctica 269 US, southeast, predicted sea-level rise 91 USS Nautilus 199, 428
V Vaceletia ospreyensis 261 valleys, drowned 88, 148 Valonia ventricosa 249 Vampire Squid 291 Vampyroteuthis infernalis 291
Vancouver, George (1757–98) 102 Vancouver Island 463 Vanuatu 473 Varanus indicus 381 Varanus salvator 381 veliger larvae 281 Vellar Estuary 134 Velvet Belly Lanternshark 328 Velvet Crab 294 Velvet Horn 249 Vembanad Lake 121 Vendée Globe Challenge 57 Venice flooding 90 Lagoon 120, 442 venom Beaked Sea Snake 378 Box Jellyfish 266 Crown of Thorns Starfish 309 Fire Urchin 309 Flower Urchin 309 pedicellariae 309 Rabbit fish 326 Vent Tubeworm 189 vents hydrothermal 34, 185, 188–89 archaea 232 East Pacific Rise 478 fauna 189 Giant Tube Worm 317 Pompeii Worm 171 Venus Comb 286 Venus’s Girdle 319 Vereker Banks 467 Verne, Jules (1828–1905) 80 Veron, Charlie (born 1945) 270 Verrucaria maura 256, 257 Verrucaria serpuloides 256 vertebrates 258 Vesuvius 442 Vibrio fischeri 233 Victoria Harbor, Hong Kong 99 Violet Seasnail 214, 258 Violet-Spotted Reef Lobster 230–31 Viperfish, Sloane’s 348 Virgularia mirabilis 268 Vityaz Trench 473 volcanoes Andean 45 Andes 479 at convergent plate boundaries 50 Capelinhos, Azores 441 Gulf of Guinea 447 Hawaii 103, 470 Indian Ocean 459 island chains 51, 466, 470, 480 Java Trench 455 Les Pitons, St. Lucia 95 Lesser Antilles 444 and mass extinction 229 Mediterranean 442, 443 Melanesia 472, 473 Middle America Trench 478 Mount St. Helens 463 as origin of water 45 Pacific Ocean 460 Pico del Teide, Canary Islands 441 Polynesia 477 Ring of Fire 184 Sea of Okhotsk 464 South Sandwich Islands 449 undersea 174 Volvo Ocean Race 57 von Karman vortices 52–53 vortices 79, 80–81, 83 von Karman 52–53 Vridi Canal 121
W Wadden Sea 127 waders 384 Wakame (Asian Kelp) 150 Walrus 407 Waminoa species 273 Wandering Albatross 391 warm currents 66 warm-water coral 153 warming, ocean 192 Wash, the 128
water behavior of light 38–39 density 33 global reservoirs 64 heat capacity 33 molecules 32–33 origin 45 properties 32–33 as solvent 34 stratification, Hardanger Fjord 119 surface tension 32 three states 33 Water Bear 318 water bears 315 water cycle, global 64–65 Water Flea 295 Water Monitor 134, 381 water quality, Chesapeake Bay 116 water striders 32 water twister 33 water vapour, early Earth 45 waterfall, submarine 182 waterspouts 71 wave-cut platforms 89 wave-erosion 93 wavelength 76 waves barrel 30–31 breaking 77 giant, effect of El Niño 68 internal 76 ocean 76–77 generation 76 propagation 76 properties 76 refraction 77 rogue 76 shoaling 77 standing 79, 82 see also tsunamis Weddell Sea 484 Weddell Seal 199, 222, 409 Wedge-tailed Shearwater, migration 393 Wegener, Alfred (1880–1930) 46, 47 Wellington, New Zealand, tides 79 West African Manatee 422 West Indian Manatee 423 West Mariana Basin 469 West Mariana Ridge 469 West Wind Drift 482 westerlies 54, 429, 432, 451, 461 Western Algarve, marine erosion 97 Western Interior Seaway 47 Western Mediterranean 442 Whale Beluga 116, 199, 417 migration 221 Blue 416 migration 421 Bowhead 412 Cuvier’s Beaked 417 Gray 412 migration 421 Humpback 412, 414–15, 420 feeding 200–201 migration 421 song 39, 413 Killer 419 Minke 413 Northern Bottlenose 417 Northern Right 412 Pacific Gray 123, 464 Pilot, Long-finned 422 Southern Right 412 migration 421 Sperm 222, 416 White see Whale, Beluga Whale Shark 258, 330 whale song 39, 413 whale stranding 422 whale watching 123, 421 whales early 228 echolocation 39, 404 migration 421 navigation 421 whaling 405, 412 Faroe Islands 422 South Georgia 449
Whelk, Dog 286 Whimbrel 399 Whip Coral 272 Whipray, Reticulate 335 whirlpools 79, 80–83 Strait of Messina 442 White Cliffs of Dover 96, 180 White Mangrove 130, 132 White Sea Whip 267 White Shark 331, 332–33 white smokers 188 White Tern 401 White Whale see Beluga Whale White Zoanthid 272 White-bellied Sea Eagle 397 Whitetip Reef Shark 334 Whitetip Soldierfish 354 Wilson’s Storm Petrel 393 wind farming 439 Baltic 438, 439 windrows, Langmuir circulation cells 61 winds Arctic Ocean 429 Atlantic Ocean 432 Indian Ocean 451 monitoring 54 ocean 54–55 Pacific Ocean 461 polar northeasterlies and southeasterlies 54, 429, 483 pressure-system 55 effect of El Niño/La Niña 68–69 prevailing 54, 58 von Karman vortices 52–53 Roaring Forties 54 role in wave generation 76 southeast monsoon 461 Southern Ocean 482, 483 southwest monsoon 451 trade 54, 432, 451, 461 westerlies 54, 429, 432, 451, 461, 482, 483 Wobbegong, Tasseled 329 Woese, Carl (born 1928) 232 Wolf-fish 365 Wood Stork 132 world oceans 426–27 Worm Bootlace 275 Football Jersey 275 Ribbon 275 worms ribbon 275 roundworms 315 segmented 276 Wrack, Knotted 241 Wrasse Ballan 142 Cleaner 365 Cuckoo 365 reproduction 340 Wreckfish 362 wrecks see shipwrecks Wren Marsh 127 Zapata 133 Wuhan Bridge 122
X Xanthoria parietina 257 Xenia elongata 267 Xestospongia testudinaria 260 Xi Jiang River 122
Y yacht racing 56–57 Yamato Basin 464 Yamato Ridge 464 Yangtze Estuary 122, 466 Yatsu-Higata tidal flat 129 Yellow Bluff Tide Rip 82 Yellow Horned-poppy 254 Yellow River, suspended sand 466 Yellow Sea 466 Yellow Shrimp Goby 368 Yellow Splash Lichen 257 Yellow-bellied Sea Snake 378
Yellow-lipped Sea Krait 372, 378 Younghusband Peninsula 121 Yucatan Channel 444 Yukon River 462
Z Zalophus californianus 407 Zapata Rail 133 Zapata Swamp 133 Zapata Wren 133 Zebra Nerite 286 Zebra Shark 329 Zeus faber 355 Ziphius cavirostris 417 zircon 44 Zoanthid, White 272 zooplankton 181, 214, 319 sunlit zone 169–70 vertical migration 221 zooxanthellae 153, 263 Zostera capensis 148 Zostera marina 148, 150
atlas index
atlas INDEX This index lists features shown in the Atlas of the Oceans (pp.426– 85). It includes the names of features on the sea floor and sea surface, such as the names of seas. It also includes physical features on land, such as islands and headlands.
A
Abrolhos Bank 446 Acklins Island 445 Adare Seamounts 485 Adare, Cape 483, 485 Adelaide Island 484 Aden, Gulf of 426, 450, 452 Admiralty Island 463 Adriatic Basin 443 Adriatic Sea 442 Aegean Sea 443 Aegir Ridge 434, 436 Africana Seamount 450 Agadir Canyon 441 Agalega Islands 458 Agassiz Fracture Zone 427, 461 Agassiz, Cape 484 Agattu Island 462 Agulhas Basin 426, 450 Agulhas Plateau 450 Aitutaki 476 Ajo, Cabo de 441 Akademii Nauk Rise 465 Akademik Kurchatov Fracture Zone 440 Akpatok Island 430 Åland 437 Alaska Peninsula 463 Alaska Plain 461, 463 Alaska Seamount Province, Gulf of 463 Alaska, Gulf of 427, 461, 463 Albina, Ponta 447 Alboran Sea 442 Alcock Rise 454 Aldabra Group 458 Aleutian Basin 426, 461, 462 Aleutian Islands 426, 461, 462 Aleutian Rise 462 Aleutian Trench 426, 461, 462, 463, 465 Alex Heiberg Island 429, 430 Alexander Archipelago 463 Alexander Island 483, 484 Algarve 441 Algerian Basin 442 Alix Seamount 459 Alpha Cordillera 429 Alphecca Seamount 471 Altair Seamount 440 Alula-Fartak Trench 453 Alvarado Ridge 479 Amami-O-shima 466, 468 Amazon Fan 433, 446 Amazon, Mouths of the 446 Amchitka Island 462 Amchitka Pass 462 America–Antarctica Ridge 427, 433, 482 Amirante Basin 458 Amirante Islands 458 Amirante Ridge 458 Amirante Trench 458 Ampere Seamount 441 Amsterdam Fracture Zone 451 Amsterdam Island 451 Amukta Pass 462 Amund Ringnes Island 430 Amundsen Gulf 428, 430 Amundsen Plain 427, 461, 483, 485 Amundsen Sea 427, 461, 483, 484 Amundsen Trough 428, 430 Anadyr, Gulf of 461, 462 Anaximander Ridge 443
Andaman Basin 451, 454 Andaman Islands 451 Andaman Sea 426, 451, 454 Andreanof Islands 462 Andrew Seamount 450 Andrew Tablemount 453 Andros Island 445 Anegada Gap 445 Anegada Passage 445 Anglesey 436 Angola Basin 427, 433, 447 Angria Bank 453 Anjouan 458 Ankabna, Tanjona 458 Anna Trough 431 Annobón 447 Antalya Basin 443 Antalya, Gulf of 443 Antarctic Peninsula 427, 461, 483, 484 Antartic Canyon 484 Antialtair Seamount 440 Anticosti, Île d’ 435 Antipodes Islands 481 Anton Bruun Ridge 458 Anvers Island 484 Apulian Plateau 443 Aqaba, Gulf of 452 Arabian Basin 426, 451, 453 Arabian Peninsula 426, 450 Arabian Sea 426, 451, 453 Arafura Sea 426, 460, 472 Arafura Shelf 460, 472 Archipiélago de Camagüey 445 Archipiélago de Sabana 445 Arctic Ocean 428–29 Arenas, Punta de 448 Argentine Basin 427, 433 Argo Fracture Zone 451, 459 Arnhem Land 472 Arnhem, Cape 472 Aru, Kepulauan 472 Aruba Gap 445 Ascension Fracture Zone 427, 433, 447 Ascension Island 447 Asia 429 Astrid Ridge 433 Atafu Atoll 476 Atia 476 Atka Island 462 Atlantic Ocean 432–33 Atlantic–Indian Basin 426, 433, 450 Atlantic–Indian Ridge 427, 433, 450, 482 Atlantis Fracture Zone 433, 440 Atol das Rocas 446 Attu Island 462 Auckland Islands 481 Austral Fracture Zone 477 Australes, Îles 476 Aves Ridge 445 Azores 427, 440 Azores Plateau 440 Azores–Biscay Rise 433, 440 Azov, Sea of 443
B Bab el Mandeb 452 Baffin Basin 427, 429, 430, 433 Baffin Bay 427, 429, 430, 432 Baffin Island 427, 430 Bahama Basin 445 Bahama Escarpment 445 Bahia Seamount 446 Bahía, Islas de la 444 Baja California 471 Baker Island 476 Bakutis Coast 485 Balabac Strait 467 Balearic Basin 442 Balearic Islands 442 Bali 455 Bali Sea 455
Ball’s Pyramid 481 Balleny Islands 460, 483, 485 Balleny Seamounts 485 Baltic Sea 433, 437 Banaba 469, 473 Banâs, Râs 452 Banda Sea 426, 455, 460, 467, 468, 472 Bangka, Pulau 455, 467 Banks Island 427, 428, 430, 473 Banks Peninsula 481 Banks Rise 428, 430 Banks Shelf 428, 430 Banzare Seamounts 451, 483 Baranof Island 463 Barbados Trough 445 Barcoo Tablemount 481 Bardin Seamount 458 Barents Plain 429 Barents Sea 426, 429, 431 Barents Trough 429, 431 Barentsøya 429, 431 Barmade Bank 437 Barracuda Fracture Zone 427, 433 Barracuda Ridge 445 Barrier Reef 444 Barrow Island 455 Barrow, Point 428 Bashi Channel 467, 468 Bass Strait 451, 460, 480 Bassas da India 458 Bassas de Pedro Bank 453 Batabano, Golfo de 445 Batavia Seamount 451, 455 Bathurst Island 428, 430, 472 Bathurst, Cape 428, Batterbee, Cape 483 Bauer Basin 427, 461, 479 Bauer Fracture Zone 479 Bauer Scarp 479 Bauld, Cape 435 Baydaratskaya Guba 429 Bazaruto, Ilha do 458 Beagle Channel 448 Bear Peninsula 484 Beata Ridge 445 Beaufort Island 485 Beaufort Sea 427, 428, 430 Beaufort Shelf 428 Beaufort Slope 428 Behaim Seamount 484 Belém Ridge 446 Belgica Bank 429, 431 Belgrano Bank 484 Belitung, Pulau 455, 467 Belle Île 441 Belle Isle 435 Belle Isle, Strait of 435 Bellingshausen Plain 427, 461, 483, 484 Bellingshausen Sea 427, 461, 483, 484 Bellona Plateau 473, 481 Bellona Valley 481 Bengal, Bay of 426, 451, 454 Benham Plateau 467, 468 Benin, Bight of 447 Bering Canyon 462 Bering Sea 426, 428, 461, 462, 465 Bering Strait 426, 428, 461, 462 Beringa, Ostrov 462 Berkner Bank 484 Berkner Island 483, 484 Bermuda Rise 433, 445 Biafra, Bight of 447 Bikini Atoll 469 Bill Baileys Bank 434, 436 Bioco, Isla de 447 Biscay Plain 433, 441 Biscay, Bay of 441 Biscoe Islands 484 Bismarck Archipelago 468 Bismarck Sea 426, 460, 468, 472 Bjørnoya 429, 431 Bjornöya Bank 429, 431
Black Coast 484 Black Sea 426, 433, 443 Blake Abyssal Plain 445 Blake Basin 445 Blake Escarpment 445 Blake Plateau 432, 445 Blake Spur 445 Blake-Bahama Ridge 445 Blanc, Cap 442 Blue Ridge Seamount 467 Bo Hai 466 Bobaomby, Tanjona 458 Bode Verde Fracture Zone 433, 446, 447 Bogorov Seamount 465 Bohai 466 Bohai Wan 466 Bohol 467, 468 Bohol Sea 467, 468 Boknafjorden 437 Bollons Tablemount 461, 481, 483 Bon, Cap 442 Bonaire 445 Bonaire Basin 445 Bonaparte Seamount 447 Bone Basin 455, 472 Bone, Teluk 455, 472 Bonin Ridge 466, 468 Bonin Trench 460, 466, 468 Boothia Peninsula 428, 430 Boothia, Gulf of 428, 430 Bora-Bora 476 Borchgrevink Coast 485 Borden Island 428, 430 Borden Peninsula 430 Boreas Plain 429, 431 Borneo 426, 455, 460, 467 Bornholm 437 Bosporus 443 Bothnia, Gulf of 431, 437 Bougainville Island 473 Bounty Islands 481 Bounty Trough 481 Bowers Bank 462 Bowers Basin 462 Bowers Ridge 462 Bowers Seamount 462, 463 Brabant Island 484 Bransfield Strait 448, 484 Brazil Basin 427, 433, 446 Breidhafjördhur 434 Bristol Bay 461, 463 Bristol Channel 436, 441 Britain 427, 429 Brodeur Peninsula 428, 430 Broken Ridge 426, 451 Bruce Ridge 449, 484 Brunt Ice Shelf 484 Bryan Coast 484 Buka Island 473 Bulldog Bank 458 Bunce Seamounts 453 Buorkhaya Guba 429 Burdwood Bank 448 Burke Island 484 Burks, Cape 485 Buru, Pulau 455, 467, 468, 472 Bylot Island 429, 430 Byramgore Reef 453
C
Cabo de Gata 442 Cabo San Juan 447 Cabot Strait 435 Cadiz, Gulf of 441 Calabar Canyon 447 Calarca Bank 445 California, Gulf of 461, 471 Camões Seamount 453 Campbell Island 481, 461 Campbell Plateau 426, 461, 481, 483 Campeche Bank 444 Campeche Canyon 444
Campeche Escarpment 444 Campeche, Bay of 444 Canada Basin 427, 428, 430 Canada Plain 428 Canary Basin 440 Canary Islands 427, 441 Canaveral, Cape 445 Canisteo Peninsula 484 Canterbury Bight 481 Cape Basin 427, 433 Cape Bathurst, Cape 430 Cape Breton Island 435 Cape Prince Alfred 428, 430 Cape Verde Basin 427, 433 Cape Verde Islands 427 Cape Verde Plain 433 Cape Verde Terrace 433 Cape York Peninsula 472 Cardigan Bay 436 Cardno Tablemount 447 Cargados Carajos Bank 458 Caribbean Sea 427, 432, 445, 478 Carlsberg Ridge 426, 451, 453 Carnegie Ridge 478 Caroline Islands 460, 468 Caroline Ridge 468 Carpentaria, Gulf of 472 Cascadia Basin 461, 463 Caseyr, Raas 450, 453 Catoche Tongue 444 Caucasus Escarpment 443 Cay Sal Bank 445 Cayman Ridge 445 Cayman Trench 445 Ceara Plain 433, 446 Ceará Ridge 446 Cebu 467, 468 Cedros Trench 461, 471 Cedros, Isla 471 Celebes 426, 455, 460, 467, 468, 472 Celebes Basin 467, 468 Celebes Sea 426, 460, 467, 468 Celtic Sea 436, 441 Celtic Shelf 433, 436, 441 Central Basin Trough 467, 468 Central Kara Plateau 429 Central Pacific Basin 426, 461, 476 Central Slope 444 Ceram Sea 467, 468, 472 Ceylon Plain 426, 451, 454, 455 Chagos Archipelago 451, 459 Chagos Bank 459 Chagos Trench 451, 459 Chagos–Laccadive Plateau 426, 451, 453, 459 Chain Fracture Zone 433, 446, 447 Chain Ridge 450, 453 Chalkidiki 443 Challenger Deep 460 Challenger Fracture Zone 427, 461 Challenger Plateau 481, 483 Channel Islands 436, 441, 471 Chapman, Cape 428, 430 Charcot Island 484 Charcot Seamounts 441 Charlie-Gibbs Fracture Zone 427, 433, 440 Chatham Islands 461, 481 Chatham Rise 461, 481, 483 Cheetham, Cape 485 Cheju Strait 466, 468 Cheju-do 464, 466, 468 Cherbaniani Reef 453 Chesapeake Bay 435 Cheshskaya Guba 431 Chichagof Island 463 Chidley, Cape 430 Chile Basin 427, 461, 479 Chile Rise 427, 461 Chile Trench 448 Chinook Trough 470 Chíos 443 Chirikof Basin 462
505
506
atlas index Choiseul 473 Choyo Seamount 468 Christmas Island 455 Christmas Ridge 461, 476 Chukchi Plain 428 Chukchi Plateau 428 Chukchi Sea 426, 428, 462 Chukotskiy Peninsula 428 Chukotskiy Poluostrov 462 Chukotskiy, Mys 462 Churchill Peninsula 484 Chuuk Islands 468 Cilicia Trough 443 Clarence, Isla 448 Clarion Fracture Zone 427, 461, 471 Clarion Island 471 Clark Basin 445 Clipperton Fracture Zone 427, 461, 476 Coats Island 430 Coco-de-Mer Seamounts 458 Cocos Basin 426, 451, 454, 455 Cocos Islands 455 Cocos Ridge 478 Cod, Cape 435 Colombian Basin 445 Colombian Trench 478 Colón Ridge 461, 478 Columbia, Cape 429 Colville Ridge 481 Colvocoresses Reef 453 Committee Bay 428, 430 Commodore Reef 467 Comoro Basin 450, 458 Comoros 450 Conception Bank 441 Congo Fan 433, 447 Constantine, Cape 463 Cook Inlet 463 Cook Strait 481 Cora Diva Bank 453 Coral Sea 426, 460, 473, 480 Coral Sea Basin 460, 472 Coral Sea Islands 472, 480 Corfu 443 Cornwallis Island 428, 430 Coronation Gulf 428, 430 Corsica 442 Corvo 440 Cosmoledo Group 458 Costa Blanca 442 Costa Brava 442 Costa del Sol 442 Costa Verde 441 Côte d’Azur 442 Coulman Island 485 Courland Lagoon 437 Cozumel, Isla 444 Crary Bank 485 Cretan Trough 443 Crete 443 Crete, Sea of 443 Crimea Escarpment 443 Crimean Peninsula 443 Crozet Basin 426, 450 Crozet Islands 450, 482 Crozet Plateau 450 Cruiser Tablemount 440 Cruz, Cabo 445 Cumberland Peninsula 430 Cumberland Sound 430 Curaçao 445 Cuvier Basin 451, 455 Cuvier Plateau 451, 455 Cyclades 443 Cyprus Basin 443
D D‘Entrecasteax Islands 472 Dacia Seamount 441 Dahlak Archipelago 452 Daito Ridge 466, 468 Dallas Reef 467 Dalmatia 442 Damar, Kepulauan 472 Dampier Seamount 447 Dana Fracture Zone 479 Danube Cone 443 Danzig, Gulf of 437 Dao 467 Dao Phu 467 Dardanelles 443
Darien, Gulf of 445 Darnley, Cape 483 Davidson Bank 462 Davie Ridge 450, 458 Davis Coast 448 Davis Sea 483 Davis Seamounts 433 Davis Strait 427, 430, 433 Dawhat Sawqirah 453 De Soto Canyon 444 Dead Sea 443 Dean Island 485 Del Cano Rise 450 Delaware Bay 435 Delgada Fan 471 Delgado, Cabo 450, 458 Demerara Plain 427, 433 Denmark Strait 427, 429, 433, 434 Denson Seamount 463 Derwent Hunter Guyot 481 Deryugina Basin 465 Desventurados, Islas de los 479 Deutschland Canyon 484 Devil’s Hole 437 Devon Island 429, 430 Devon Shelf 429, 430 Devon Slope 429, 430 Diamantina Fracture Zone 451 Dickins Seamount 463 Diego Garcia 459 Dirk Hartog Island 455 Discovery Basin 452 Discovery Tablemounts 433 Dixon Entrance 463 Doberai 467 Dodecanese 443 Dogger Bank 437 Doldrums Fracture Zone 433 Dollerman Island 484 Dolphin and Union Strait 428, 430 Dominica Passage 445 Donegal Bay 436 Dorchester, Cape 430 Dover, Strait of 437 Drake Passage 427, 433, 448, 461, 482 Dreadnought Bank 454 Dronning Maud Land 484 Ducie Island 477 Dufek Coast 485 Dumont D’Urville Sea 483 Dumshaf Plain 429, 431 Dundee Island 448, 484 Dungeness, Punta 448 Durgin Seamount 463 Dustin Island 484
E East Azores Fracture Zone 433, 440 East Black Sea Escarpment 443 East Cape 481 East Caroline Basin 460, 468 East China Sea 426, 460, 466, 468 East Falkland 448 East Indiaman Ridge 451, 455 East Mariana Basin 460, 468 East Mexico Shelf 444 East Novaya Zemlya Trough 429, 431 East Pacific Rise 427, 461, 471, 478, 479, 483 East Scotia Basin 433, 449, 482 East Scotia Ridge 449 East Sea 426 East Sheba Ridge 453 East Siberian Sea 426, 428 East Tasman Plateau 480 East Thulean Rise 440 Easter Fracture Zone 427, 461, 479 Easter Island 461, 479 Eastward Knoll 445 Eauripik Rise 468 Ebro Fan 442 Edgeøya 429, 431 Edward VII Peninsula 485 Efate 473 Egeria Fracture Zone 451, 459 Egmont, Cape 481
Eights Coast 484 Eirik Ridge 433 Elephant Island 448, 484 Eleuthera Island 445 Ellef Ringnes Island 430 Ellesmere Island 427, 429, 430 Ellsworth Land 483, 484 Eltanin Fracture Zone 427, 461, 483 Emperor Seamounts 426, 461, 462, 465, 470 Emperor Trough 470 Enderbury Island 476 Enderby Plain 426, 450, 483 Endurance Canyon 484 Endurance Fracture Zone 448 Endurance Ridge 449, 484 Enewetak Atoll 469 English Channel 436, 441 English Coast 484 Entrada, Punta 448 Eratosthenes Tablemount 443 Erben Tablemount 471 Erimo Seamount 465 Erromango 473, 481 Error Tablemount 453 Espichel, Cabo 441 Espiritu Santo 473 Estados, Isla de los 448 Etolin Strait 462 Euboea 443 Eugenia, Punta 471 Europa, Île 458 Europe 429 Euxine Plain 443 Evans Strait 430 Everard, Cape 480 Exmouth Plateau 451, 455 Explorer Seamount 463 Exuma Sound 445 Exuma Valley 445
F Faeroe Bank 434, 436 Faeroe Gap 434, 436 Faeroe Islands 429 Faeroe Shelf 434. 436 Faeroe–Iceland Ridge 434, 436 Faeroe–Shetland Trough 429, 434, 436 Faial 440 Fair Isle 437 Fakaofo Atoll 476 Falkland Escarpment 433 Falkland Islands 427, 482 Falkland Plateau 433, 448 Falkland Trough 448 Falster 437 Faraday Fracture Zone 440 Farewell Island 484 Farewell, Cape 481 Farquhar Group 458 Fartak, Ra’s 453 Faxaflói 434 Fernando do Noronha 446 Fernando do Noronha Plain 446 Ferrat, Cap 442 Ferraz Ridge 446 Ferris Seamount 479 Fieberling Tablemount 471 Fifty Fathoms Flat, The 453 Fiji 426, 461 Fiji Plateau 473 Filchner Ice Shelf 484 Fimbul Ice Shelf 484 Finland, Gulf of 437 Fiordland 481 Fisher Strait 430 Fiske, Cape 484 Fisterra, Cabo 441 Flemish Cap 440 Flint Island 476 Flores 440, 455, 472 Flores Basin 455, 472 Flores Sea 455, 472 Florida Escarpment 444 Florida Keys 445 Florida Plain 444 Florida, Straits of 445 Florida-Hatteras Slope 445 Fogo Island 435 Formentera 442 Fortune Bank 458
Four North Fracture Zone 446 Foveaux Strait 481 Fox Islands 462 Foxe Basin 430, 432 Foxe Channel 430 Foxe Peninsula 430 Fram Basin 429 Franklin Island 485 Franz Josef Land 426, 429, 431 Fraser Island 480 Fred Seamount 450, 458 Freshfield, Cape 485 Fria, Cape 447 Friesian Islands 437 Frobisher Bay 430 Frøya Bank 437 Fuerteventura 441 Fugløya Bank 429, 431 Funafuti 473, 476 Fundy, Bay of 435 Furneaux Group 480 Futuna, Île 473, 476 Fyn 437
G Gabès, Golfo de 442 Gakkel Ridge 429 Galápagos Fracture Zone 427, 461, 476 Galápagos Islands 427, 461, 478 Galápagos Rise 461, 479 Galicia Bank 441 Gallego Rise 461 Galway Bay 436 Gambia Plain 433 Gambier Islands 477 Ganges Fan 426, 451, 454 Ganges, Mouths of the 454 Gardner Pinnacles 470 Gascoyne Plain 451, 455 Gascoyne Seamount 481 Gaspé, Péninsule de 435 Gazelle Basin 481 Gela Basin 442 Genoa, Gulf of 442 George Bligh Bank 434, 436 George V Coast 485 George VI Sound 484 Georgia, Strait of 463 Gettysburg Seamount 441 Geyser Reef 458 Giacomini Seamount 463 Gibbs Seamount 445 Gibraltar, Strait of 433, 441, 442 Gibson Seamount 463 Gilbert Ridge 469, 473 Gilbert Seamount 463 Gilbert Seamounts 461, 463 Giraud Seamount 458 Gizhiginskaya Guba 465 Glacier Bay 463 Goban Spur 436, 441 Gofar Fracture Zone 478 Gold Coast 480 Gomera 440 Gonâve, Golfe de la 445 Good Hope, Cape of 427, 482 Goodhope Bay 462 Gorringe Ridge 441 Gotland 437 Gotland Basin 437 Goto-retto 466, 468 Gough Fracture Zone 427, 433, 482 Gould Coast 485 Graciosa 440 Graham Land 484 Grand Banks of Newfoundland 433 Grande Comore 458 Grande, Bahía 448 Grant Island 485 Great Abaco 445 Great Abaco Canyon 445 Great Australian Bight 426, 451 Great Bahama Bank 445 Great Bahama Canyon 445 Great Bahama Island 445 Great Barrier Reef 426, 460, 472, 480 Great Fisher Bank 437 Great Inagua 445 Great Lakes 427
Great Meteor Tablemount 433, 440 Great Yangtze Bank 466, 468 Greater Antilles 427, 432, 445 Greenland 427, 429 Greenland Fracture Zone 429, 431 Greenland Plain 429, 431 Greenland Sea 427, 429, 431 Greenland–Iceland Rise 434 Grenada Basin 445 Grey Islands 435 Grijalva Ridge 478 Gröll Seamount 446 Groote Eylandt 472 Guacanayabo, Golfo de 445 Guadalcanal 473 Guadalupe, Isla 471 Guadeloupe Passage 445 Guafo Fracture Zone 461 Guantanamo Bay 445 Guatemala Basin 427, 461, 478 Guayaquil, Gulf of 478 Guevara Seamounts 449 Guinea Basin 427, 433, 447 Guinea, Gulf of 433, 447 Gusinaya Bank 431 Gydanskiy Poluostrov 429
H Hadd, Ra’s al 453 Hainan 467 Hainan Dao 460 Haixia 466 Halaniyat, Khalij al 453 Halk El Menzel Bank 442 Hall Peninsula 430 Hall Tablemount 458 Halmahera Sea 467, 468, 472 Halmahera, Pulau 467, 468, 472 Halten Bank 429, 431, 437 Hardangerfjorden 437 Harris Seamount 461 Hartog Ridge 451 Hatteras Plain 427, 432, 445 Hatteras Ridge 445 Hatteras, Cape 435, 445 Hatton Ridge 433, 434 Hatton–Rockall Basin 434 Hauraki Gulf 481 Havre Trough 481 Hawai‘i 461, 470 Hawaiian Islands 427, 461, 470 Hawaiian Ridge 426, 461, 470 Hawaiian Trough 470 Hawke Bay 481 Hayes Fracture Zone 440 Hazel Holme Bank 473 Heard and McDonald Islands 451, 483 Hearst Island 484 Hebridean Shelf 434, 436 Hebrides Seamount 436 Hecate Seamount 440 Hecate Strait 463 Heimaey 434 Helgoland Bay 437 Hellenic Trough 443 Henderson Island 477 Henry Ice Rise 484 Hero Fracture Zone 448, 484 Herodotus Basin 443 Herodotus Rise 443 Herodotus Seamount 443 Herodotus Trough 443 Hess Rise 470 Hierro 440 Hiiumaa 437 Hikurangi Trench 481 Hillary Canyon 485 Hillary Coast 485 Hispaniola 445 Hispaniola Basin 445 Hitra 437 Hiva Oa 477 Hobbs Bank 485 Hobbs Coast 485 Hokkaido 426, 460, 465 Home Bay 430 Honguedo Passage 435 Honshu 426, 460, 465, 466, 468 Hopen 431 Hormuz, Strait of 453
atlas index Horn of Africa 450 Horn, Cape 427, 448, 461, 482 Horseshoe Seamounts 433, 441 Hoste, Isla 448 Hotspur Seamount 433, 446 Hovgaard Fracture Zone 429, 431 Howland Island 476 Hoyt Hills 445 Hudson Bay 427, 430, 432 Hudson Strait 430, 432 Hudson, Cape 485 Hunaflói 434 Hunter Ridge 473 Hydra Seamount 458
I Iberian Plain 427, 433, 441 Ibiza 442 Iceland 427, 429 Iceland Basin 427, 433, 434, 436 Iceland Plateau 429, 431, 434 Imarssuak Channel 433 Indian Ocean 450–51 Indomed Fracture Zone 450 Indus Fan 451, 453 Inland Sea 466, 468 Inner Hebrides 436 Inner Islands 458 Institut Okeanologii Rise 465 Investigator Ridge 426, 451, 455 Invisible Bank 454 Ionian Basin 443 Ionian Islands 443 Ionian Sea 443 Ireland 427 Ireland Trough 436 Irish Sea 436 Irrawaddy, Mouths of the 454 Isakov Seamount 468 Iselin Bank 485 Iselin Seamount 485 Islas Orcadas Ridge 482 Islas Orcadas Rise 433, 449 Iwo–Jima Ridge 466, 468 Izu Spur 466, 468 Izu Trench 466, 468 Izu-shoto 466, 468
J Jaguar Seamount 458 Jamaica Channel 445 James Ross Island 484 Jan Mayen 429, 431 Jan Mayen Fracture Zone 429, 431 Jan Mayen Ridge 429 Japan Basin 460, 465 Japan Trench 426, 460, 465, 466 Japan, Sea of 426 Japan, Sea of/East Sea 460, 466, 468 Jarvis Island 476 Jason Peninsula 484 Java 426, 451, 455, 460 Java Ridge 451. 455 Java Sea 426, 455, 460 Java Trench 426, 451, 455 Jaza’ir Farasan 452 Jazirah 467 Jazirah Doberai 468, 472 Jodies Basin 485 Johnston Atoll 470 Joinville Island 448, 484 Jones Sound 430 Joseph Bonaparte Gulf 472 Juan de Fuca, Strait of 463 Juan Fernández, Islas 479 Juby, Cap 441 Jutland Bank 437 Juventud, Isla de la 445 Jylland 437
K Kachchh, Gulf of 453 Kai, Kepulauan 472 Kamchatka Basin 462, 465 Kamchatka Peninsula 426, 460, 462, 465
Kamchatka Terrace 462 Kamchatskiy Zaliv 462, 465 Kammu Seamount 461, 470 Kanton 476 Kara Sea 426, 429, 431 Kara Strait 429, 431 Karaginskiy Zaliv 465 Karaginskiy, Ostrov 462 Karaginsky Zaliv 462 Karkinitt, Gulf of 443 Karpathos 443 Kashevarov Bank 465 Kathiawar Peninsula 453 Kattegat 437 Kaua’i 470 Kazan-retto 466, 468 Kellett, Cape 428, 430 Kenai Peninsula 463 Kerch Strait 443 Kerguelen 451, 483 Kerguelen Plateau 426, 451, 483 Kermadec Islands 476, 481 Kermadec Ridge 481 Kermadec Trench 426, 461, 476, 481 Khambhat, Gulf of 453 Khayyam Seamount 471, 478 Kiel Bay 437 King Island 480 King Peninsula 484 King William Island 428, 430 Kingman Reef 476 Kings Trough 440 Kiritimati 476 Kiska Island 462 Kitty Hawk Seamount 467 Knipovich Ridge 429, 431 Knipovich Seamount 446 Knowles, Cape 484 Knox, Cape 463 Ko Samui 467 Kodiak Island 461, 463 Kodiak Seamounts 463 Kolbeinsey Ridge 429, 434 Komandorskiye Ostrova 462, 465 Korea Bay 466 Korea Strait 464, 466, 468 Korean Plateau 464, 466 Korff Ice Rise 484 Koro Sea 473, 476, 481 Kosrae 469 Kotzebue Sound 428 Kra, Isthmus of 467 Kronotskiy Zaliv 462, 465 Kronprinsesse Martha Kyst 484 Kure Atoll 470 Kuril Gap 465 Kurile Basin 460, 465 Kurile Islands 426, 460, 465 Kurile Trench 426, 460, 462, 465 Kuskokwim Bay 462 Kvitøya 429, 431 Kwajalein Atoll 469 Kyushu 460, 464, 466, 468 Kyushu-Palau Ridge 460, 466, 467, 468
L La Nao, Cabo de 442 La Palma 440 La Pérouse Seamount 458 La Perouse Strait 465 Labrador Basin 427, 433 Labrador Sea 427, 433 Laccadive Islands 451, 453 Laeso 437 Laizhou Wan 466 Lana’i 470 Lancaster Sound 430 Lancaster Trough 430 Land’s End 436, 441 Lanzarote 441 Laptev Sea 426, 429 Larsen Ice Shelf 484 Larsen Sound 428, 430 Lassiter Coast 484 Latady Island 484 Lau Basin 473, 476, 481 Lau Group 473, 476, 481 Lau Ridge 473, 476, 481 Lavoisier Island 484 Laysan Island 470 Lazarev Sea 433, 482
Leeward Islands 445 Lena Seamount 450 Lena Trough 429, 431 Lesbos 443 Lesser Antilles 445 Lesser Sunda Islands 455, 472 Levantine Basin 443 Leven Bank 458 Lexington Seamount 467 Leyte 467, 468 Liaodong 466 Ligeti Ridge 449, 484 Ligurian Sea 442 Limos 443 Lincoln Sea 429 Lindesnes 437 Line Islands 461, 476 Lingga, Kepulauan 455, 467 Lisburne, Cape 428 Lisianski Island 470 Litke Trough 429, 431 Little America Basin 485 Little Bahama Bank 445 Lolland 437 Lombok Basin 455 Lomonosov Ridge 429 London Reefs 467 Londonderry, Cape 455, 472 Long Bay 445 Long Island 435, 445 Lookout, Cape 435 Lopez, Cap 447 Lord Howe Island 481 Lord Howe Rise 426, 460, 481 Lord Howe Seamounts 481 Los Roques Basin 445 Los Roques, Islas 445 Lost Dutchmen Ridge 455 Loubet Coast 484 Lougheed Island 428, 430 Louisiade Archipelago 473 Louisiade Plateau 473 Louisville Ridge 426, 461, 476, 481 Loyalty Islands 473, 481 Luitpold 484 Luzon 467, 468 Luzon Ridge 467, 468 Lyddan Island 484 Lyra Basin 468 Lyra Reef 468, 473
M Mabahiss Fracture Zone 459 Macclesfield Bank 467 Mackenzie Bay 426, 483 Mackenzie King Island 428, 430 Macquarie Island 481 Macquarie Ridge 460, 481 Madagascar 426, 450 Madagascar Basin 426, 450, 458 Madagascar Plateau 426, 450, 458 Madeira 440 Madeira Plain 427, 433, 440 Madeira Ridge 440 Madeleine, Îles de la 435 Madingley Rise 458 Madrakah, Ra’s 453 Maewo 473 Mafia 458 Magellan Rise 476 Magellan Seamounts 460, 468 Magellan, Strait of 448 Mahabiss Fracture Zone 451 Maine, Gulf of 435 Majorca 442 Majuro Atoll 469 Makarov Basin 429 Makarov Seamount 460, 468 Makassar Strait 455, 460, 467, 472 Makran Coast 453 Malacca, Strait of 451, 454, 467 Malaita 473 Malay Peninsula 451, 467 Malden Island 476 Maldives 451 Malekula 473 Malin Head 436 Mallorca Channel 442 Malta Channel 442 Malta Plateau 442 Malta Trough 442 Man, Isle of 436
Mangaia 476 Manihiki Plateau 461, 476 Manila Trench 467 Mannar, Gulf of 454 Mansel Island 430 Manson Bank 485 Manus Island 468, 472 Manus Trench 468, 472 Mapmaker Seamounts 426, 460, 469 Maracá, Ilha de 446 Maracaibo, Lake 445 Marajó, Ilha de 446 Maranhao Seamount 446 Marcus Island 468 Margarita, Isla de 445 Marguerite Bay 484 Mariana Ridge 468 Mariana Trench 426, 460, 468 Marie Byrd Land 485 Marie Celeste Fracture Zone 451, 459 Marmara, Sea of 443 Marquesas Fracture Zone 427, 461, 477 Marquesas Islands 427, 461, 477 Marshall Seamounts 461, 469 Marsili Seamount 442 Martaban, Gulf of 454 Martha’s Vineyard 435 Martin Peninsula 484 Martin Vaz, Ilhas 446 Martinique Passage 445 Mascarene Basin 426, 450, 458 Mascarene Islands 458 Mascarene Plain 450, 458 Mascarene Plateau 426, 450, 458 Masirah, Jazirat 453 Masirah, Khalij 453 Masoala, Tanjona 458 Mathematicians Seamounts 461, 471 Maud Rise 433 Maui 470 Mauritius 450 Mauritius Trench 458 Maxwell Fracture Zone 440 Mayotte 458 McClintock Channel 428, 430 McClure Strait 428, 430 Mecklenburg Bay 437 Medina Bank 442 Mediterranean Ridge 443 Mediterranean Sea 426, 427, 433, 441, 443 Mednyy Seamount 462, 465 Mednyy, Ostrov 462 Melanesia 426, 460, 473 Melanesian Basin 426, 460, 469 Melita Bank 442 Mellish Rise 473, 480 Mellish Seamount 470 Melville Island 428, 430, 472 Melville Peninsula 428, 430 Melville Trough 428, 430 Menard Fracture Zone 427, 461, 483 Mendaña Fracture Zone 427, 461, 479 Mendeleyev Plain 428 Mendeleyev Ridge 426, 428 Mendocino Fracture Zone 427, 461, 470, 471 Mendoza Rise 479 Mentawai Basin 455 Mentawai Ridge 455 Mentawai Trough 455 Mentawai, Kepulauan 455 Mergui Terrace 454 Messina, Strait of 442 Meta Incognita Peninsula 430 Mexico Basin 444 Mexico, Gulf of 427, 432, 444 Michelson Ridge 468 Micronesia 426, 460, 468 Mid-Pacific Seamounts 469 Mid-Atlantic Ridge 427, 433, 440, 447, 482 Middle America Trench 427, 461, 471, 478 Mid-Indian Basin 426, 451, 455, 459 Mid-Indian Ridge 426, 451, 459 Mid-Ocean Canyon 433, 440 Mid-Ocean Channel 427
Mid-Pacific Mountains 426, 460 Mid-Pacific Seamounts 470 Midway Islands 461, 470 Millennium Island 476 Miller Seamount 463 Milne Seamounts 440 Minami Daito Basin 466 Minch, The 436 Mindanao 467, 468 Mindoro 467, 468 Minicoy Island 453 Minorca 442 Mirtoo Pelagos 443 Mississippi Fan 444 Mississippi Slope 444 Mississippi-Alabama Shelf 444 Mohéli 458 Mohns Ridge 429 Moloka‘i 470 Molokai Fracture Zone 427, 461, 470, 471 Molucca Sea 455, 467, 468, 472 Moluccas 455, 460, 467, 468, 472 Mona Canyon 445 Mona Passage 445 Mondego, Cabo 441 Mono Rise 445 Monterey Fan 471 Moonless Mountains 461, 471 Moorea 476 Moray Firth 436 Mornington Abyssal Plain 427, 461, 483 Moro Gulf 467, 468 Moro Reef 470 Morotai, Pulau 467, 468 Morris Jesup, Kap 429 Mosquito Bank 445 Mosquito Coast 445 Mouchoir Passage 445 Mozambique Channel 426, 450, 458 Mozambique Escarpment 450, 482 Mozambique Plateau 426, 450, 458 Muertos Trough 445 Murmansk Rise 431 Murray Fracture Zone 427, 461, 470, 471 Murray Ridge 451, 453 Murray Seamount 463 Musashi Banks 465 Musicians Seamounts 461, 470 Mussau Trench 468 Mys Alevina 465 Mys Aniva 465 Mys Enkan 465 Mys Olyutorskiy 465 Mys Shipunskiy 465 Mys Sivuchiy 465 Mys Taygonos 465 Mys Terpeniya 465 Mys Tolstoy 465 Mys Yelizavety 465 Mys Yuzhnyy 465
N Namibia Plain 433 Nankai Trough 466, 468 Nansen Basin 426, 429 Nantucket Island 435 Nares Plain 427, 433, 445 Nares Strait 429, 430 Nashville Seamount 445 Nassau 476 Natal Basin 426, 450, 458 Natuna Sea 455, 467 Natuna, Kepulauan 467 Naturaliste Fracture Zone 451 Naturaliste Plateau 451 Navarin, Mys 462 Navarino, Isla 448 Nazareth Bank 458 Nazca Ridge 427, 461, 479 Near Islands 462 Necker Island 470 Necker Ridge 470 Negros 467, 468 Nemaya Zemyla 426 Nevel’skoye Seamount 465 New Britain 472
507
508
atlas index New Britain Trench 472 New Caledonia 460 New Caledonia Basin 481 New Caledonia Trough 473, 481 New England Seamounts 433 New Georgia Islands 473 New Georgia Sound 473 New Guinea 426, 460, 467, 468, 472 New Guinea Trench 468, 472 New Hebrides Ridge 481 New Hebrides Trench 461, 473, 481 New Ireland 468, 472 New Zealand 426, 461, 483 Newenham, Cape 462 Newfoundland 427, 435 Newfoundland Basin 427, 433, 440 Newfoundland Seamounts 440 Newman Island 485 Nias, Pulau 455 Nicaraguan Rise 445 Nicobar Islands 451 Niger Fan 433, 447 Nihoa 470 Nile Fan 443 Ninetyeast Ridge 426, 451, 454, 455 Nordaustlandet 429, 431 Norfolk Island 481 Norfolk Ridge 461, 481 North Australian Basin 451, 455 North Cape 429, 431 North Channel 436 North Fiji Basin 426, 461, 473, 481 North Island 461, 481, 483 North Kanin Bank 431 North Kenya Bank 458 North Makassar Basin 455, 467 North New Hebrides Trench 473 North Oki Bank 465, 466 North Pole 429 North Sea 427, 433, 437 North West Cape 455 North, Cape 435 Northern Cook Islands 461, 476 Northland Plateau 481 Northwest Georgia Rise 449 Northwest Hawaiian Ridge 470 Northwest Pacific Basin 426, 460, 462, 465, 468 Northwest Slope 444 Northwind Plain 428 Northwind Ridge 428 Norton Plain 462 Norton Sound 462 Norvegia, Cape 482, 484 Norwegian Basin 427, 429, 431, 433, 437 Norwegian Sea 427, 429, 431, 433, 434, 437 Norwegian Trench 429, 437 Nosy Be 458 Nosy Glorieuses 458 Nosy Sainte Marie 458 Noto-hanto 465 Notre Dame Bay 435 Nottingham Island 430 Nova Scotia 435 Nova Trough 461, 476 Novaya Zemlya 429, 431 Novosibirskiye Ostrova 426, 429 Nuku Hiva 477 Nukunonu Atoll 476 Nunivak Island 462 Nutibara Trough 445 Nyasa, Lake 458
O O’ahu 470 O’Gorman Fracture Zone 478 Oates Bank 485 Ob’ Trench 451 Obruchev Rise 462, 465 Obruchev Seamount 465 Obskaya Guba 429 Oceanographer Fracture Zone 427, 433, 440 Oeno Island 477 Ogasawara Trough 466, 468
Ogasawara-shoto 466, 468 Okhotsk, Sea of 426, 460, 462 Oki Bank 465 Oki Ridge 465, 466 Oki Trough 465, 466 Okidaito Ridge 466, 467, 468 Okinawa 466, 468 Okinawa Trough 466, 468 Oki-shoto 465, 466 Öland 437 Oléron, Île d’ 441 Olympus Knoll 440 Olyutorskiy Zaliv 462, 465 Olyutorskiy, Mys 462 Oman Basin 453 Oman, Gulf of 450, 453 Ona Basin 448 Onslow Bay 445 Ontong Java Rise 460, 468, 473 Orange, Cabo 446 Orkney Deep 449, 484 Orkney Islands 436 Orona 476 Orozco Fracture Zone 471, 478 Ortegal, Cabo 441 Orville Coast 484 Osborn Plateau 451, 455 Oshawa Seamount 463 Ostrov Belyy 429 Ostrov Beringa 465 Ostrov Bol’shevik 429 Ostrov Bol’shoy Lyakhovskiy 429 Ostrov Iturup 465 Ostrov Karaginskiy 465 Ostrov Kolguyev 431 Ostrov Komsomolets 429 Ostrov Kotel’nyy 429 Ostrov Kunashir 465 Ostrov Mednyy 465 Ostrov Novaya Sibir’ 428 Ostrov Oktyabr’skoy Revolyutsii 429 Ostrov Paramushir 465 Ostrov Sakhalin 426, 460, 465 Ostrov Simushir 465 Ostrov Urup 465 Ostrov Vrangelya 428 Ostrovnoy Seamount 465 Otranto, Strait of 443 Otway, Cape 480 Outer Bailey 434, 436 Outer Hebrides 434, 436 Owen Fracture Zone 450, 453 Ozbourn Seamount 476, 481
P P’enghu Liehtao 466 Pacific Ocean 460–61 Pacific–Antarctic Ridge 426, 461, 483 Padre Island 444 Palau 460 Palau Sumba 472 Palau Trench 467, 468 Palawan 467 Palawan Trough 467 Palk Strait 454 Palmas, Cape 447 Palmeirinhas, Ponta das 447 Palmerston 476 Palmyra Atoll 476 Palos, Cabo de 442 Panama Basin 478 Panama Canal 445 Panama Fracture Zone 478 Panama, Gulf of 478 Panay 467, 468 Pandora Bank 473 Panikkar Seamount 453 Papua Plateau 472 Papua, Gulf of 472 Paracel Islands 467 Paría, Gulf of 445 Parker Seamount 463 Parnaíba Ridge 446 Parry Islands 428, 429, 430 Patagonian Shelf 448 Pate Island 458 Patton Escarpment 471 Patton Seamount 463 Patton Seamounts 463 Pearl and Hermes Reef 470
Pedro Bank 445 Pedro Escarpment 445 Peel Sound 428, 430 Peloponnese 443 Pemba 450, 458 Peninsula Brunswick 448 Péninsule d‘Ungava 430 Pennell Bank 485 Penrhyn 476 Penrhyn Basin 461, 476 Pentecost 473, 481 Penzhinskaya Guba 465 Pernambuco Basin 433, 446 Pernambuco Plateau 446 Pernambuco Seamounts 446 Persian Gulf 450, 453 Perth Basin 426, 451 Peru Basin 427, 461, 479 Peru–Chile Trench 427, 461, 478, 479 Pervenets Canyon 462 Peter I Island 484 Peters Ridge 463 Pheonix Islands 461 Philippine Basin 426, 460, 467, 468 Philippine Sea 426, 460, 466, 467, 468 Philippine Trench 460, 467, 468 Philippines 426, 460 Phoenix Islands 476 Pico 440 Pico Fracture Zone 440 Pierre Brazza Seamounts 447 Pioneer Fracture Zone 471 Pitcairn Island 461, 477 Placentia Bay 435 Plenty, Bay of 481 Pliny Trench 443 Pockington Trough 473 Pohnpei 469 Poinsett, Cape 483 Pole Plain 429 Poluostrov Kanin 431 Poluostrov Taymyr 429 Poluostrov Yamal 429 Polynesia 461, 476 Pomeranian Bay 437 Porcupine Bank 436, 441 Porcupine Plain 433, 440 Porcupine Seabight 441 Portlock Bank 463 Pourtales Escarpment 445 Powell Basin 448, 484 Pratt Seamount 463 Prestrud Bank 485 Pribilof Islands 462 Prince Albert Peninsula 428, 430 Prince Albert Sound 428, 430 Prince Charles Island 430 Prince Edward Fracture Zone 450, 482 Prince Edward Island 435 Prince Edward Islands 450, 482 Prince of Wales Island 428, 430, 463 Prince of Wales Strait 430 Prince Patrick Island 428, 430 Prince Regent Inlet 428, 430 Prince William Sound 463 Príncipe 447 Proliv Longa 428 Proliv Vil’kitskogo 429 Protector Basin 448 Providence Reef 458 Prydz Bay 451 Ptolemy Seamounts 443 Puerto Rico Trench 433, 445 Pukapuka 476 Punta Gallinas 445
Q Qamar, Ghubbat al 453 Qeqertarssuaq 429, 430 Qeshm 453 Quebrada Fracture Zone 478 Queen Charlotte Islands 461, 463 Queen Elizabeth Islands 427, 428, 429, 430 Queen Maud Gulf 428, 430 Queen Charlotte Sound 463
Queensland Plateau 472 Quest Fracture Zone 448 Quinn Seamount 463 Quôc 467
R Race, Cape 435 Rae Strait 428, 430 Ralik Chain 469 Raman Guyot 453 Rarotonga 476 Rat Islands 462 Ratak Chain 469 Raukumara Plain 481 Raz, Pointe du 441 Ré, Île de 441 Red Sea 426, 450, 452 Reed Bank 467 Reinga Ridge 481 Reinga, Cape 481 Renaud Island 484 Rennell 473 Researcher Seamount 445 Resolution Island 430 Réunion 450, 458 Revillagigedo Islands 471 Reykjanes Basin 427, 433, 434 Reykjanes Ridge 427, 433, 434 Rhir, Cap 441 Rhodes 443 Rhodes Basin 443 Rhône Fan 442 Richardson Hills 445 Rifleman Bank 467 Riga, Gulf of 437 Riiser–Larsen Ice Shelf 484 Rio Grande Fracture Zone 427, 433 Rio Grande Rise 427, 433 Ritchie Bank 458 Rivera Fracture Zone 471, 478 Robbie Ridge 476 Robertson Island 484 Roca, Cabo de 441 Rochebonne, Plateau de 441 Rocher Percé 435 Rockall 434, 436 Rockall Bank 433, 434, 436 Rockall Trough 436 Rodgers Seamount 446 Rodrigues 451, 459 Rodrigues Ridge 459 Roe Bank 454 Roes Welcome Sound 430 Roggeveen Basin 427, 461, 479 Romanche Fracture Zone 433, 446 Ronne Basin 484 Ronne Ice Shelf 427, 483, 484 Roo Rise 455 Roosevelt Island 483, 485 Rosalind Bank 445 Rosemary Bank 434, 436 Ross Bank 485 Ross Ice Shelf 426, 461, 483, 485 Ross Island 485 Ross Sea 426, 461, 483, 485 Røst Bank 429, 431, 437 Rothschild Island 484 Rowley Shelf 451, 455, 472 Rowley Shoals 455, 472 Royal Bishop Banks 467 Royal Charlotte Bank 446 Royalist Bank 467 Rugen 437 Ruppert Coast 485 Rydberg Peninsula 484 Ryukyu Islands 466, 467, 468 Ryukyu Ridge 466, 468 Ryukyu Trench 426, 460, 466, 467, 468 Ryurik Seamount 453
S Saaremaa 437 Sable Island 435 Sable, Cape 435 Sado 466 Sado Ridge 465, 466 Sagar Kanya Seamount 453 Sahul Banks 455, 472
Sahul Shelf 451, 455, 472 Saint Elias, Cape 463 Saint Helena 447 Saint Helena Fracture Zone 433, 447 Saint Lawrence Island 462 Saint Matthew Island 462 Saint Paul Fracture Zone 433, 446 Saint Peter Fracture Zone 446 Saipan 468 Sakhalinskiy Zaliv 465 Sakishima-shoto 466, 468 Sala y Gomez 479 Sala y Gomez Ridge 461, 479 Salinas, Ponta das 447 Salisbury Island 430 Salûm, Gulf of 443 Samar 467, 468 Samoa 461 Samoa Basin 461, 476 San Agustin, Cape 467, 468 San Andrés Trough 445 San Cristobal 473 San Lucas, Cabo 471 San Martin Canyon 484 Sangir, Kepulauan 467, 468 Santa Cruz Basin 473 Santa Cruz Islands 473 Santa Inés, Isla 448 Santa Isabel 473 Santa Maria 440 Santaren Channel 445 Santos Plateau 433 São Jorge 440 São Miguel 440 São Roque, Cabo de 446 São Tomé 447 São Vicente, Cabo de 441 Sardinia 442 Sardinia Terrace 442 Sardinia–Corsica Trough 442 Sargasso Sea 427, 433, 445 Sarmiento Ridge 479 Sars Bank 448 Saunders Coast 485 Saury Seamount 445 Savai’i 473, 476 Savu Basin 455, 472 Savu Sea 455, 472 Saya de Malha Bank 459 Schoppe Ridge 463 Scilly, Isles of 436, 441 Scotia Sea 427, 433, 449, 482, 484 Scott Canyon 485 Scott Coast 485 Scott Island 485 Scott Seamounts 485 Scott, Cape 463 Sea of Japan/East Sea 465 Sea of Okhotsk 465 Sealark Fracture Zone 451, 459 Seine Plain 441 Seine Seamount 441 Selat Mentawai 455 Senkaku Islands 466, 468 Seram, Pulau 467, 468, 472 Serendip Seamount 453 Sermilik Valley 434 Sesostris Bank 453 Severnaya Zemlya 426, 429 Seward Peninsula 428, 462 Sewell Rise 454 Seychelles 426, 450 Seychelles Bank 450, 458 Shackleton Coast 485 Shackleton Fracture Zone 448 Shakal, Ras 452 Shandong Bandai 466 Shantarskiye Ostrova 465 Sharbithat, Ras 453 Shark Bay 455 Shatskiy Rise 460, 465 Shcherbakov Seamount 455 Shelikhova Zaliv 465 Shelikof Strait 463 Sherard, Cape 429, 430 Shetland Islands 429, 437 Shikoku 460, 465, 466, 468 Shikoku Basin 460, 466, 468 Shimada Seamount 471 Shipunskiy, Mys 462 Shirase Coast 485 Shirshov Ridge 462, 465
atlas index Shumagin Islands 463 Shuyak Island 463 Siberia Seamount 465 Sicily 442 Sicily, Strait of 442 Sierra Leone Basin 427, 433, 447 Sierra Leone Rise 446 Sigsbee Escarpment 444 Sigsbee Plain 444 Simpson Peninsula 428, 430 Sines, Cabo de 441 Siple Coast 485 Siqueiros Fracture Zone 478 Sir Edward Pellew Group 472 Sirius Bank 446 Sirte Rise 443 Sirte, Gulf of 443 Sivuchiy, Mys 462 Sjaelland 437 Skagerrak 437 Skeleton Coast 447 Sklinna Bank 437 Skye, Isle of 436 Smetanin Seamount 465 Smyley Island 484 Snares Islands 481 Snowhill Island 484 Society Islands 461, 476 Society Ridge 476 Socotra 450, 453 Sofala, Baia de 458 Sognefjorden 437 Sohm Plain 427, 433, 445 Solomon Basin 473 Solomon Islands 460 Solomon Sea 426, 460, 472 Somali Basin 426, 450, 453, 458 Somerset Island 428, 430 Sonmiani Bay 453 Sorol Trough 468 Soudan Bank 458 South Australian Basin 426, 451 South Australian Plain 426, 451 South Bank 437 South China Basin 426, 460, 467 South China Sea 426, 460, 467 South East Point 480 South Fiji Basin 426, 461, 473, 476, 481 South Georgia 427, 449, 482 South Georgia Ridge 448 South Georgia Rise 449 South Indian Basin 426, 451, 483, 485 South Island 461, 481, 483 South Makassar Basin 455 South Orkney Islands 449, 482, 484 South Pole 483 South Sandwich 449 South Sandwich Fracture Zone 482, 484 South Sandwich Islands 449, 484 South Sandwich Trench 433, 449, 482, 484 South Scotia Ridge 448 South Shetland 484 South Shetland Islands 448, 482, 484 South Shetland Trough 448, 484 South Solomon Trench 473 Southampton Island 430 Southeast Indian Ridge 426, 451, 483 Southeast Pacific Basin 427, 461, 483 Southern Cook Islands 461, 476 Southern Ocean 482–83 Southwest Indian Ridge 426, 450, 459 Southwest Pacific Basin 427, 461, 476, 481, 483 Spaatz Island 484 Spitsbergen 427, 429, 431 Spitsbergen Fracture Zone 429, 431 Sporades 443 Spratly Islands 467 Sri Lanka 426, 451 St. George’s Channel 436 St. James, Cape 463 St. Lawrence, Gulf of 433, 435 St. Lawrence Seaway 435 St. Lucia Channel 445
St.-Malo, Golfe de 436, 441 St. Paul Island 451 St. Peter and St. Paul Rocks 446 St. Vincent Channel 445 Starbuck Island 476 Steele Island 484 Stefansson Island 428, 430 Stewart Island 481 Stewart Seamount 446, 467 Stocks Seamount 446 Stor Bank 429, 431 Storfjordrenna 429, 431 Strabo Trench 443 Stradbroke Seamount 481 Sue Ridge 445 Suez, Gulf of 452 Sula, Kepulauan 455, 467, 468, 472 Sulu Archipelago 467 Sulu Basin 467 Sulu Sea 467, 468 Sulzberger Bay 485 Sumatra 426, 451, 455, 460, 467 Sumba, Pulau 455 Sumbawa 455, 472 Sunda Shelf 426, 455, 460, 467 Sunda Trench 451, 454, 455 Surtsey 434 Surveyor Fracture Zone 461, 470 Surveyor Seamount 463 Suwarrow 476 Sverdrup Islands 428, 429, 430 Swan Trough 444 Syvataya 431 Syvataya Anna Trough 429
T Tabuaeran 476 Tadjoura Trench 452 Taganrog, Gulf of 443 Tagus Plain 441 Tahiti 461, 476 Taiwan 426, 460 Taiwan Banks 466, 467 Taiwan Strait 426, 460, 466 Takoma Reef 462 Takuyo-daiichi Seamount 465 Talaud, Kepulauan 467, 468 Tanaga Island 462 Tanega-shima 466, 468 Tanimbar, Kepulauan 472 Tanna 473 Taranto, Gulf of 443 Tarawa 469 Tasman Fracture Zone 426, 460, 480 Tasman Plain 460, 480 Tasman Plateau 451, 480 Tasman Sea 426, 460, 481 Tasmania 426, 451, 460, 480 Tatar Trough 465 Tatarskiy Proliv 465 Taupo Tablemount 481 Tehuantepec Ridge 478 Tehuantepec, Gulf of 478 Tehuantepec, Istmo de 444 Tehuelche Fracture Zone 448–49 Ten Degree Channel 454 Tenerife 441 Teraina 476 Terceira 440 Tern Island 470 Texas-Louisiana Shelf 444 Thailand, Gulf of 460, 467 Theta Gap 441 Thitu Reefs 467 Thomson Trough 481 Thor Iversen Bank 429, 431 Thracian Sea 443 Three Kings Rise 481 Three Points Spur 447 Three Points, Cape 447 Thurston Island 483, 484 Tierra del Fuego 448 Tiki Basin 427, 461, 477 Timbue, Ponta 458 Timor 451, 455, 460, 472 Timor Sea 426, 455, 472 Timor Trough 455, 460, 472 Tinaca Point 467, 468 Tinian 468 Tinro Basin 465 Tinro Rise 465
Tintamarre Spur 445 Tobago 445 Tobago Basin 445 Tolo, Teluk 455 Tomaszeski Seamount 476 Tomini, Gulf of 455, 467, 472 Tonga 461 Tonga Ridge 473, 476, 481 Tonga Trench 426, 461, 473, 476, 481 Tongatapu Group 473, 476, 481 Tongking, Gulf of 467 Tongue of the Ocean 445 Torres Seamount 478 Torres Strait 472 Tortuga, Isla de 445 Toyama Seamount 465 Toyama Trench 465 Traena Bank 437 Traena Deep 437 Transkei Basin 450 Trindade, Ilha da 446 Trinidad 445 Tromelin 458 Trondheimsfjorden 437 Tsushima 464, 466 Tsushima Basin 464, 466 Tuamotu Fracture Zone 461, 477 Tuamotu Islands 427, 461, 476 Tuamotu Ridge 461, 476 Tufts Plain 461 Tungaru 469, 473 Tunisian Plateau 442 Tutuila 476 Tyrrhenian Basin 442 Tyrrhenian Sea 442
W
Udintsev Fracture Zone 427, 461, 483 Udskaya Guba 465 Ulithi 467, 468 Ulm Plateau 462 Umboi Island 472 Umnak Island 462 Umnak Plateau 462 Unalaska Island 462 Ungava Bay 430 Unimak Island 462 Union Reefs 467 Upolu 473, 476 Uruguay Canyon 484
Wakasawan 465 Wake Island 469, 470 Walgreen Coast 484 Walker Bank 437 Wallaby Plateau 451, 455 Wallis, Îles 473, 476 Walvis Ridge 427, 433 Wan 466 Wandel Sea 429 Wash, The 437 Weddell Plain 427, 433, 482, 484 Weddell Sea 427, 433, 483, 484 Weiss Bank 437 Welker Seamount 463 Well Bank 437 Wellesley Islands 472 Wessel Islands 472 West Black Sea Escarpment 443 West Caroline Basin 460, 467, 468 West Caroline Rise 468 West Caroline Trough 468 West Falkland 448 West Florida Shelf 445 West Florida Slope 445 West Mariana Basin 460, 467, 468 West Mariana Ridge 468 West Norfolk Ridge 481 West Scotia Ridge 448 West Sheba Ridge 452 Wetar, Pulau 455, 472 Whales Bay Furrows 485 Wharton Basin 426, 451, 455 White Bay 435 White Island 485 White Marsh Seamount 463 White Sea 431 Whitsunday Group 472 Wight, Isle of 436, 441 Wilkes Rise 458 Wilshaw Ridge 458 Windward Islands 445 Windward Passage 445 Wollaston Peninsula 428, 430 Wormley Seamount 458 Wrangel Plain 429 Wrath, Cape 434, 436 Wyville Thomson Ridge 434, 436
V
X
U
Valencia Basin 442 Valencia Trough 442 Valencia, Golfo de 442 Vancouver Island 427, 461, 463 Vanua Levu 473, 476 Vanuatu 461 Vava’u Group 473, 476, 481 Vavilov Seamount 442 Vema Fracture Zone 433, 451, 459 Vema Gap 445 Venezuela, Gulf of 445 Venezuelan Basin 445 Venice, Gulf of 442 Vening Meinesz Seamounts 455 Vereker Banks 467 Vestfjorden 429, 431, 437 Victoria Island 427, 428, 430 Victoria Land 485 Viking Bank 437 Viking Trough 434, 436 Vilanandra, Tanjona 458 Vincennes Bay 483 Virgin Passage 445 Virik Bank 485 Viscount Melville Sound 430 Viscount Melville Strait 428 Viti Levu 473, 476, 481 Vityaz Trench 473 Vlieland Bank 437 Vohimena, Tanjona 458 Volcán Bank 445 Voring Plateau 429, 431, 433, 437 Voronin Trough 429 Vostok Island 476
Xaafuun, Raas 453
Y Yaghan Basin 433, 448 Yaku-shima 466, 468 Yamato Basin 465, 466 Yamato Ridge 465, 466 Yamato Seamount 465 Yap 467, 468 Yap Trench 467, 468 Yelcho Canyon 484 Yellow Sea 426, 460, 466, 468 Yermak Plateau 429, 431 York, Cape 472 Yos Sudarso, Pulau 472 Yucatan Basin 445 Yucatan Channel 444 Yucatan Escarpment 444 Yucatan Peninsula 444 Yupanqui Basin 427, 461, 479
Z Zambezi Canyon 458 Zanzibar 450, 458 Zapiola Ridge 433 Zenkevich Rise 465 Zephyr Bank 476 Zephyr Reef 473 Zheng He Seamount 453 Zubov Seamount 447, 469
509
510
acknowledgments
acknowledgments Dorling Kindersley would like to thank several people for their help in the preparation of this book. At the American Museum of Natural History, Udayan Chattopadhyay was unfailingly helpful and John Sparks provided many valuable comments on the text and images. Georgina Garner and Erin Richards worked on early versions of the contents list. Frances Dipper and Robert Dinwiddie drew up the original lists of species and physical features described in the catalog sections. Additional design work was done by Janis Utton and Pankaj Sharma. Tamlyn Calitz and Amy Walters provided editorial assistance, and Klara Kayser contributed design assistance. Neil Fletcher did additional picture research for the Birds section. PICTURE CREDITS Dorling Kindersley would like to thank the following for their help in supplying images: Romaine Werblow in the DK Picture Library; All at SeaPics.com; All at FLPA; Jonathan Hamston at OSF; Teresa Riley at Getty Images; All at Alamy Images. KEY: (a-above; b-below/bottom; c-center; f-far; l-left; r-right; t-top)
SIDEBAR IMAGES Corbis: David Keaton (Atlas of the Oceans); Jeffrey L. Rotman (Ocean Environments). Getty Images: National Geographic/Raul Touzon (Ocean Life); Photonica/Anna Grossman (Introduction).
1 Getty Images: Taxi/Peter Scoones. 2—3 Getty Images: Stone/Warren Bolster. 4 Corbis: (tc); Lawson Wood (bc). 4–5 Getty Images: National Geographic/Brian Skerry. 5 Getty Images: Image Bank/Mike Kelly (tc). NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (cra). 6–7 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (Background). 8–9 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Chris Newbert, Carrie Vonderhaar. 10–11 Still Pictures: Kim Heacox. 12–13 Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell. 14 SeaPics.com: Kevin Schafer. 15 DeepSeaPhotography.Com: Kim Westerskov. 16– 17 David Hall (www.seaphotos.com). 18–19 Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay. 20 Getty Images: Iconica/John W. Banagan. 21 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Frans Lanting. 22–23 Angel M. Fitor (www.seaframes.com). 24 Getty Images: Image Bank/Jeff Hunter. 25 FLPA: Minden Pictures/ZSSD. 26–27 naturepl.com: Mark Carwardine. 28–29 Corbis. 30–31 Getty Images: Taxi/Jason Childs. 32 Alamy Images: Pictor International/ImageState (bc). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (bl). 32–33 Alamy Images: Hawkeye (c). 33 Alamy Images: Bryan & Cherry Alexander Photography (br). DK Images: (fbl); Brian Cosgrove (bc); Zena Holloway (bl). NASA: GSFC/MODIS Rapid Response Team, Jacques Descloitres (tl); Liam Gumley, MODIS Atmosphere Team, University of Wisconsin-Madison Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies (ca). 34 Alamy Images: David Wall (br). Science & Society Picture Library: Science Museum, London (bl). 35 Alamy Images: PHOTOTAKE Inc./Carolina Biological Supply Company (bc); Stephen Frink Collection/James D. Watt (ca); Visual&Written SL/Kike Calvo (cra). NASA: Provided by the SeaWiFS Project, Goddard Space Flight Center, and ORBIMAGE (br). 36 NASA: MODIS Instrument Team, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, (c); The U.S.-French TOPEX/ Poseidon mission is managed by JPL for NASA’s Earth Science Enterprise, Washington, D.C. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena (tr). 37 Alamy Images: Roger Cracknell (cl); Chris A Crumley (tr). DK Images: Frank Greenaway/Courtesy of the University Marine Biological Station, Millport, Scotland (crb). SeaPics. com: Bob Cranston (ca). 38 Alamy Images: Brandon Cole Marine Photography (cla); Reinhard Dirscherl (cb). Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (bc). Image Quest Marine: Y. Kito (bl). 38–39 Alamy Images: Visual&Written SL/Takaji Ochi (c). 39 AguaSonic Acoustics: Mark Fischer (crb). Alamy Images: Sue Cunningham Photographic (cra); James Davis
Photography (cr); Dinodia Images/Ashvin Mehta (tr). Science Photo Library: (cb). 40–41 Corbis: Brenda Tharp. 43 Japan Agency for Marine–Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC): (cra). 44 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (c). Corbis: Raymond Gehman (bc). DK Images: Harry Taylor (cra). 45 NASA: JPL (br). Science Photo Library: Bill Bachman (tr). 47 Corbis: Bettmann (tc); David Lawrence (cra). 48 Alamy Images: Norman Price (tr). Planetary Visions (bl). 48–49 Alamy Images: Nordicphotos/Sigurgeir Sigurjonsson (b). 49 Planetary Visions (tr). 50 DK Images: Colin Keates/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (tr). 51 Alamy Images: Douglas Peebles Photography (br). Woods Hole Oceanographic Instititution: Jayne Doucette (cra). 52–53 Corbis: Image by Digital image © 1996 CORBIS; Original image courtesy of NASA. 54 NASA: JPL (fcr); Image courtesy Quickscat Science Team (cr). 55 Alamy Images: Kos Picture Source (t). DK Images: Peter Wilson (bl). 56 Action Images: Reuters/Carlo Borlenghi. 57 Alamy Images: Kos Picture Source (br). Corbis: Emmanuelle Thiercelin (cr). Getty Images: AFP/Marcel Mochet (tr); Clive Mason (cra). Rex Features: RAAF-AUSTRAL/ Corbis Sygma (crb). 58–59 NASA: Image courtesy the SeaWiFS Project, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, and ORBIMAGE (c). 59 Alamy Images: Chris Linder (br). Corbis: Bettmann (tr). NASA: (cr); Image processed by Robert Simmon based on data from the SeaWiFS project and the Goddard DAAC (c). 60 SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (bl). 61 S.M.R.U: Simon Moss (bl). Courtesy of Andreas M. Thurnherr: (br). 62 Getty Images: Nordic Photos/Kristjan Fridriksson. 63 Alamy Images: Bryan & Cherry Alexander Photography (tr); Apex News and Pictures Agency/Tim Cuff (br). Corbis: Lowell Georgia (crb). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Flip Nicklen (c). 64 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (bl). 65 Corbis: Bettmann (cla); Sygma/Gyori Antoine (bl). Getty Images: Photographer’s Choice/Kerrick James (tr). NASA: Image courtesy Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC (clb). NOAA: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS, ORA (br). 66 Alamy Images: Aflo Foto Agency (tr); Boating Images Photo Library/Keith Pritchard (cra); Michael J. Kronmal (br); Tribaleye Images/J Marshall (bl). Corbis: Image by Digital image © 1996 CORBIS; Original image courtesy of NASA (clb). 67 Alamy Images: Mark Lewis (b); PHOTOTAKE Inc./ Dennis Kunkel (tc). Getty Images: Photographer’s Choice/Malcolm Fife (tr). Courtesy of US Navy: Photo courtesy of Ian R. MacDonald, Texas A&M Univ. Corpus Christi (cla). 68 Alamy Images: Bill Brooks (cb); Images&Stories (br). Courtesy of Chris Baisan, University of Arizona: (bl). NASA: JPL (cl). 69 Corbis: Jonathan Blair (ca); EPA/Josue Fernandez (b). NOAA: Lieutenant Mark Boland, NOAA Corps (cla). 70 NASA: Image by Jesse Allen, NASA Earth Observatory; data provided by the MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC (cl); Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (cr); Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (c). NOAA: Aircraft Operations Center (br). 71 Corbis: EPA/Alejandro Ernesto (bl). OSF/photolibrary: Warren Faidley (t). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (cr). Still Pictures: Michel Gunther (br). 72 Corbis: Reuters/Vincent Laforet. 73 Corbis: Dallas Morning News/Irwin Thompson (cr); Dallas Morning News/Smiley N. Pool (br); EPA/Vincent Laforet (cra); Jim Reed Photography/Mike Theiss (tr). Getty Images: AFP/Robert Sullivan (crb). NASA: Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team (clb). 74–75 Getty Images: Lonely Planet Images/Karl Lehmann. 76 Alamy Images: David Gregs (cr); ImagePix (bc). iStockphoto.com: Dan Brandenburg (cra). NOAA: Captain Andy Chase (bl). OSF/photolibrary: Pacific Stock (crb). 77 Alamy Images: Michael Diggin (bl). Getty Images: Taxi/Helena Vallis (t). iStockphoto.com: Paul Topp (br). 78 Alamy Images: Mooch Images (clb). 78–79 Getty Images: Robert Harding World Imagery/Lee Frost (b). 80 Alamy Images: Mary Evans Picture Library (br); Ian Simpson (bl). Don Dunbar (www.easternmaineimages.com): (tl) (c). 81 Alamy Images: Malcolm Fife (cb); Peter L. Hardy (bc). Still Pictures: Markus Dlouhy (tr). www.uwphoto.no: Erling Svensen (cl). 82 Alamy Images: Shaughn F. Clements (b); phototramp.com/ Maciej Tomczak (cr). 83 Corbis: Dave Bartruff (l); Christie’s Images (br). 84–85 Corbis: Lawson Wood. 86–87 Getty Images: Photonica/Photolibrary.com. 88 Corbis: Yann Arthus-Bertrand (br). NASA: (clb). 89 Corbis: Michael Busselle (bc); Lloyd Cluff (t); Ecoscene/John Wilkinson (clb). DK Images: Colin Keates/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (crb). 90 Rex Features: Sipa Press (SIPA).
91 Alamy Images: Louise Murray (br). Corbis: Matthieu Paley (c); Sygma/Kapoor Baldev (crb). Still Pictures: Bryan Lynas (tc); Mark Lynas (tr) (cr). 92 Alamy Images: Michael Howell (b). Corbis: Yann Arthus-Bertrand (cra); Jack Fields (c); Frans Lanting (tr). 93 Alamy Images: FLPA (clb); geogphotos (fcla). Corbis: Jim Sugar (bc). iStockphoto.com: Andrew Dorey (ca); Gregor Erdmann (cla). 94 Alamy Images: Jack Stephens (cl). Rob Havemeyer Acadia National Park ME: (tr). 94– 95 Steven Russell (www.pbase.com/nodfather): (b). 95 Alamy Images: Eric Nathan (cr). Corbis: Kevin Fleming (tc). DK Images: Jon Spaull (tr). 96 Alamy Images: Atmosphere Picture Library/Bob Croxford (tr). Corbis: Ric Ergenbright (bl). DK Images: Rough Guides/Ian Aitken (crb). www. undiscoveredscotland.co.uk: (cla). 97 Alamy Images: Sean Burke (t); CuboImages srl/Marco Casiraghi (bl). NASA: Johnson Space Center - Earth Sciences and Image Analysis (br). 98 Corbis: Peter Johnson (c); Richard T. Nowitz (br). Wombat Pitts: (cra). 99 Alamy Images: Simon Reddy (cr). Getty Images: Robert Harding World Imagery/Neil Emmerson (b). Mark Kitching: (cl). NASA: Image courtesy Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC (tc). 100–101 Corbis: Digital image © 1996 CORBIS; Original image courtesy of NASA. 102 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (bc). Corbis: Bettmann (br). Still Pictures: Christoph Papsch (t). Dr Sandy Tudhope, Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Edinburgh University: (bl). 103 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (b). Getty Images: Stone/James Randklev (cl). Marco Nero: (cr). 104 WaterLand Neeltje Jans: RWS MD afd. Multimedia. 105 Alamy Images: Florida Images (cr); geogphotos (cra); Rodger Tamblyn (tc). Corbis: Lowell Georgia (bl). Natural Visions: Heather Angel (c). NOAA: NOAA Restoration Center, Chris Doley (cb). Sky Pictures luchtfotografie (www.skypictures.nl): (br). 106 Alamy Images: Patrick Mallette (cl). Getty Images: Altrendo/altrendo nature (tr); Lonely Planet Images/Bethune Carmichael (clb). 106–107 Corbis: Martin Harvey (b). 107 Alamy Images: Guillen Photography (cra); Wildscape (c). DK Images: Shaen Adey (tr); James Stevenson (tl). 108 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (tc); Peter Lewis (b). Paul Yung: (cr). 109 Alamy Images: Atmosphere Picture Library/Bob Croxford (bl); imagebroker/ Harald Theissen (cla). Corbis: Jason Hawkes (r). DK Images: Geoff Dann (br). 110 Alamy Images: Mark Boulton (tl). Corbis: Tony Arruza (bl); Yann Arthus-Bertrand (cr). 111 Alamy Images: Simon Reddy (tc); Laurie Wilson (b). Corbis: (cr). 112 Alamy Images: Ian Dagnall (tr); Danita Delimont (bc). Corbis: Douglas Peebles (br). DK Images: Lloyd Park (cl). 113 Alamy Images: Jon Arnold Images (crb). Corbis: Neil Rabinowitz (bl). Getty Images: National Geographic/Skip Brown (t). iStockphoto.com: Judi Ashlock (tr). 114 Corbis: Post-Houserstock/Dave G. Houser (cl). 114–115 Alamy Images: Jon Arnold Images/Doug Pearson (c). 115 Alamy Images: Tim Graham (ca). Corbis: (bc). DK Images: Dave King (tr). OSF/ photolibrary: Richard Herrmann (cra). 116 Getty Images: Stone/Paul Souders (bl); Stone/Tom Bean (cr). US Geological Survey: (bc). 116–117 Still Pictures: Guy Boily (t). 117 Corbis: Dale C. Spartas (bl). NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (br). 118 Corbis: Reuters/Sergio Moraes (cr). NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/ GSFC (b). Still Pictures: Jacques Jangoux (t). 119 Alamy Images: JL Images (tr). Corbis: Sygma/ Annebicque Bernard (bc). Courtesy of Clive Griffin (www.pbase.com/clivegriffin): (clb). Still Pictures: Christiane Eisler (cla). 120 Alamy Images: Jack Sullivan (cr). Pierre-Yves Lagrée, LMM CNRS Université Paris VI: (t). NASA: Earth Sciences and Image Analysis Laboratory at Johnson Space Center (b). 121 Alamy Images: Karsten Wrobel (tr). Corbis: (clb); Yann Arthus-Bertrand (cla). DK Images: Rob Reichenfeld (crb). 122 Alamy Images: Eddie Gerald (b). Corbis: Carl & Ann Purcell (cr). NASA: Provided by the SeaWiFS Project, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, and ORBIMAGE (tl). 123 Alamy Images: Tibor Bognar (cl). Corbis: Peter Guttman (br); Galen Rowell (b); Michael S. Yamashita (tr). 124 Alamy Images: Florida Images (crb); Renee Morris (bc). FLPA: Skylight (cl). 125 Corbis: James L. Amos (bc); Carol Havens (t). DK Images: Mike Linley (cr). Getty Images: Photographer’s Choice/Cameron Davidson (bl). Natural Visions: Heather Angel (br). 126 Alamy Images: Jon Sparks (t). Corbis: Rob Howard (bl). Still Pictures: Cal Vornberger (cr). 127 Alamy Images: David Poole (br); J. Schwanke (tr). Corbis: Annie Griffiths Belt (cla); Reuters/Darren Staples (crb). 128 Alamy Images: Mark Boulton
(cb); Rod Edwards (ca); Robert Harding Picture Library Ltd (br). 129 Corbis: Natalie Fobes (b); Steve Kaufman (br). Nial Moores/Birds Korea (www.birdskorea.org): (tc); Mr. Jeon Shi-Jin (cla). 130 Alamy Images: David Hosking (br). Getty Images: National Geographic/Tim Laman (tr). SeaPics.com: Jeremy Stafford-Deitsch (bc). 130– 131 Oceanwide Images: Bob Halstead (c). 131 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (cra); Reinhard Dirscherl (tr). Corbis: Michael S. Yamashita (br). SeaPics.com: D.R. Schrichte (ca). 132 DK Images: Rough Guides/Demetrio Carrasco (br); Peter Wilson (ca). 132–133 SeaPics.com: Masa Ushioda (t). 133 Alamy Images: Mireille Vautier (clb). Corbis: Stephen Frink (br). US Geological Survey: (cra). 134 Alamy Images: Tim Graham (bc). Corbis: (crb); Yann Arthus-Bertrand (ca). 135 Corbis: Arne Hodalic (cl). Getty Images: National Geographic/ Timothy Laman (tr). SeaPics.com: Jeremy StaffordDietsch (bc). Still Pictures: Alan Watson (br). 136– 137 naturepl.com: Jurgen Freund. 138–139 naturepl.com: Aflo. 140 Alamy Images: Aqua Image (cla). DK Images: Frank Greenaway/ Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (crb). iStockphoto.com: Ingvald Kaldhussæter (cra). Sue Scott: (bl). SeaPics.com: Mark Conlin (c). 141 British Marine Aggregate Producers Association (www.bmapa.org): (br). Getty Images: Image Bank/Astromujoff (t). OSF/ photolibrary: Michael Brooke (bc). 142 DK Images: Frank Greenaway/Courtesy of the Weymouth Sea Life Centre (bc); Jerry Young (cr). Sue Scott: (cl). SeaPics.com: Mark Conlin (bl). 142–143 David Hall (www.seaphotos.com): (c). 143 Image Quest Marine: Jim Greenfield (crb). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (tr). NOAA: Dr. James P. McVey, NOAA Sea Grant Program (bc). Sue Scott: (c). 144 DK Images: Frank Greenaway (ca). Sue Scott: (cl) (bl) (br). 144–145 Getty Images: National Geographic/Bill Curtsinger (t). 145 Alamy Images: Guillen Photography (bl). Sue Scott: (crb) (cra). 146 Alamy Images: Fabrice Bettex (bc); Gavin Parsons (cr). DK Images: Tim Ridley (tl). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (cla). Sue Scott: (clb). 147 Corbis: Ralph A. Clevenger (b). OSF/ photolibrary: Tobias Bernhard (tc). Sue Scott: (cla) (cra). 148 Corbis: (tl). Sue Scott: (cra) (bl). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (crb). 149 Alamy Images: Mark Lewis (b); PNR Photography (crb). Dr. Alberto V. Borges/Chemical Oceanography Unit from the University of Liège, Belgium: (tr). 150 Alamy Images: Ross Armstrong (tr); Joel Day (clb); Andre Seale (cla). Sue Scott: (bc). US Fish and Wildlife Service National Image Library: Chris Dau (br). 151 SeaPics.com: Phillip Colla. 152 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (c); Nick Hanna (cl). Corbis: Yann Arthus-Bertrand (cr). 152–153 OSF/photolibrary: Pacific Stock (c). 153 Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery. com): (tc). JM Roberts, Scottish Association for Marine Science: (crb). SeaPics.com: Clay Bryce (br); James D. Watt (cra). 154 Alamy Images: Michael Patrick O’Neill (bl); Sylvia Cordaiy Photo Library Ltd (tc). DK Images: Jerry Young (clb). 155 Alamy Images: Stephen Frink Collection (cra); Karen & Ian Stewart (c). Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (br). SeaPics. com: Andrew J. Martinez (tl); James D. Watt (bl). 156 Alamy Images: Stephen Frink Collection (bl). Corbis: Stephen Frink (c); Lawson Wood (tc). 157 Corbis: Bob Krist (b). SeaPics.com: Rodger Klein (tr). 158 Alamy Images: Nick Hanna (tr); Martin Harvey (bl); Zute Lightfoot (br). 159 Alamy Images: Steve Allen Travel Photography (tr); Slick Shoots (cr). Corbis: Cordaiy Photo Library Ltd/John Parker (cla). SeaPics.com: Marc Bernardi (b). 160 Alamy Images: Aqua Image (cla). SeaPics.com: James D. Watt (b). Still Pictures: Lynn Funkhouser (cra). 161 Alamy Images: Robert Harding Picture Library Ltd (crb); Andre Seale (clb). Corbis: Reuters/Handout (cra). Brian McMorrow: (tr). SeaPics.com: James D. Watt (br). 162–163 Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell. 164 DK Images: Frank Greenaway (clb). NASA: Image and animations provided by the SeaWiFS Project and the NASA GSFC Scientific Visualization Studio (cra). Sue Scott: (tl) (bc) (br). 165 Alamy Images: Jeremy Inglis (br); Andre Seale (bl). Image Quest Marine: Scott Tuason (t). 166–167 Getty Images: Stone/Kim Westerskov. 168 Science Photo Library: Alexis Rosenfeld (bc). 169 DeepSeaPhotography.Com: Kim Westerskov (tc). Image Quest Marine: Peter Parks (br). Science Photo Library: Susumu Nishinaga (cb). SeaPics. com: Ingrid Visser (c). 170 OSF/photolibrary: (cla); Howard Hall (b). SeaPics.com: Peter Parks/ iq3-d (tc). 171 ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (cr) (clb) (bl) (br). Image Quest Marine: Peter Herring (tr). NOAA: Archival Photography by
acknowledgments Steve Nicklas, NOS, NGS (c). OSF/photolibrary: Pacific Stock (tc). 172 Getty Images: National Geographic/Paul Nicklen. 173 Corbis: Chris McLaughlin (tr). Courtesy of Deep Flight Submersibles: (bc) (br). ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (cr). Japan Agency for Marine–Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC): (cb). Woods Hole Oceanographic Instititution: (ca). 174 Science Photo Library: (tr). 175 DeepSeaPhotography.Com: Kim Westerskov (br). NOAA: Image Courtesy of the Deep Atlantic Stepping Stones Science Party, IFE , URI-IAO, and NOAA (bc); Office of Ocean Exploration (cb). Science Photo Library: Dr Ken MacDonald (t). SeaPics.com: Mark Conlin (bl). 176 NOAA: Commander John Bortniak, NOAA Corps (bl); Fisheries Collection (br). Dr. P. J. Ramsay/African Coelacanth EcoSystem Programme: (cl). 177 Alamy Images: Ron Scott (br). ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (bc). NASA: Image provided by the USGS EROS Data Center Satellite Systems Branch (tr). NOAA: OAR/ National Undersea Research Program (NURP); University of Connecticut (ca); Ocean Explorer (cb). 178 www.uwphoto.no: Erling Svensen. 179 ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (cra). FLPA: D. P. Wilson (c). Jason Hall-Spencer/Marine Conservation Society: (crb). JM Roberts, Scottish Association for Marine Science: (bc); AWI & Ifremer 2003 (tc) (br). 180 Alamy Images: Travelpix (clb). NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (br). NOAA: National Geophysical Data Center (cla). SeaPics. com: David Wrobel (bl). 181 Alamy Images: Phototake Inc./Dennis Kunkel (bc). Image Quest Marine: Peter Parks (t). Science Photo Library: Steve Gschmeissner (cb). SeaPics.com: D.R. Schrichte (br). 182 Alamy Images: Blickwinkel (clb). ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (cla). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (bl). Craig Smith & Mike Degruy: (br). 182–183 NOAA: OAR/ National Undersea Research Program (NURP) (c). 183 naturepl.com: David Shale (bl). Naval Historical Foundation, Washington, D.C.: (br). Science Photo Library: US Geological Survey (tr). 184 Alamy Images: Fabrice Bettex (tr). Corbis: The Oregonian/Doug Beghtel (bl). 184–185 Corbis: Yann Arthus-Bertrand (b). 185 Alamy Images: David Tipling (c). Corbis: Cordaiy Photo Library Ltd/John Farmar (ca); Ralph White (tl). Planetary Visions: Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (br). 186 Planetary Visions. 187 European Space Agency: Denmann Production (clb). NASA: Canadian Space Agency/National Snow and Ice Data Centre (crb); GSFC (tr) (ca) (cra); JPL (c). Science Photo Library: David Vaughan (br). University College London: (cb). 188 Image courtesy of Karen L. Von Damm. Image obtained from the DSV Alvin, with funding provided by the U.S. National Science Foundation: (tr). Science Photo Library: Southampton Oceanography Centre/B. Murton (bl). 188–189 Woods Hole Oceanographic Instititution: (c). 189 ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (tc) (c) (br). Richard T. Lutz: (cr). NOAA: Ocean Explorer (bl). 190–191 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu. 192 Bridgeman Art Library: Royal Geographical Society, London, UK (tr). Corbis: Ecoscene/Graham Neden (cb). 193 Alamy Images: Rosemary Calvert (b); John Digby (tl). SeaPics.com: Franco Banfi (tr). 194 Alamy Images: Blickwinkel (br); Eric Ghost (fbr); K-Photos (tc). M.A. Felton: (bc). NOAA: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS, ORA (crb). 194–195 Getty Images: Photographer’s Choice/Siegfried Layda (c). 195 Alamy Images: Giles Angel (crb); Nordicphotos/Kristjan Fridriksson (tr). 196 Corbis: Sygma. 197 Corbis: Bettmann (ca) (cra); HultonDeutsch Collection (tr); Ralph White (crb) (cb) (br). Henning Pfeifer: (clb). Rex Features: ITV (ITV/ TPC) (c). 198 Alamy Images: Bryan & Cherry Alexander Photography (fbl) (br). NOAA: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS, ORA (bl). Courtesy of Don Perovich: (fbr). 198–199 Bryan and Cherry Alexander Photography: (t). 199 Corbis: Bettmann (cra). DK Images: Harry Taylor (crb). NOAA: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS, ORA (bc) (br). SeaPics.com: John KB Ford/Ursus (c). 200 NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (cl). 200–201 Alamy Images: Brandon Cole Marine Photography (b). 201 Alamy Images: Popperfoto (br). Corbis: Paul A. Souders (tc). SeaPics.com: Bryan & Cherry Alexander (c); iq3-d/Peter Parks (cra). 202–203 Getty Images: Image Bank/Mike Kelly. 204–205 DeepSeaPhotography.Com: Kim Westerskov. 206 Alamy Images: Bruce Coleman/Tom Brakefield (cl/Kingdom); Norma Jospeh (c); Visual&Written SL/ Kike Calvo (cl/Genus). Corbis: Brandon D. Cole (b/ Hagfish). DK Images: (cl/Domain); Martin Camm (cl/Phyllum) (cl/Order) (cl/Family) (cl/Species); Geoff Dann (b/Lamprey) (b/Ray-Finned Fish); Frank Greenaway (b/Cartilaginous Fish); David Peart (cl/ Class). SeaPics.com: Mark V. Erdmann (b/LobeFinned Fish). 207 DK Images: (Fungi); Neil Fletcher (Plants); Dave King (Red Seaweeds); Jane Miller (Animals); Karl Shone (Brown Seaweeds). SeaPics. com: iq3-d/Peter Parks (Protists). 208 DK Images:
(Echinoderms); Frank Greenaway (Molluscs); Dave King (Arthropods). 209 DK Images: Jerry Young (Chordates). 210 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Chris Newbert. 211 Conservation International: Robert Thacker (ca); Jeffrey T. Williams/Smithsonian Institution (c). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (crb). Dr J. Frederick Grassle, Rutgers University: (br). Sue Scott: (tr) (cra). SeaPics. com: Phillip Colla (cb). 212 Still Pictures: Steven Kazlowski (crb). 213 iStockphoto.com: Dan Schmitt (cla). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (b). Still Pictures: Bob Evans (tc). 214 DeepSeaPhotography.Com: Kim Westerskov (clb). FLPA: D. P. Wilson (cla). OSF/photolibrary: Mark Jones (br). Sue Scott: (cra) (cr) (bc). 215 M. Boyer/ edge-of-reef.com: (bc). OSF/photolibrary: Richard Herrmann (t). SeaPics.com: Masa Ushioda (br). 216 iStockphoto.com: Dan Schmitt (bl). Sue Scott: (tr) (cl) (ca). 216–217 SeaPics.com: Espen Rekdal (b). 217 Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (br). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (ca) (cr). Sue Scott: (tr). 218 FLPA: Linda Lewis (cra). Still Pictures: Secret Sea Visions (br); Gunter Ziesler (bl). 218–219 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (c). 219 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (bl). 220 Alamy Images: SCPhotos/Tom & Pat Leeson (bl); Bruce Coleman/ Patrice Ricard (fbr). iStockphoto.com: Steffen Foerster (cl). SeaPics.com: Mark Conlin (cra) (clb); Chris Huss (fbl) (br). 221 Getty Images: National Geographic/Brian J. Skerry (t). OSF/photolibrary: Doug Allan (bl). 222 Alamy Images: Brandon Cole Marine Photography (bc). FLPA: Minden Pictures/ Norbert Wu (c). 223 ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (ca) (bl). Charles G. Messing/Nova Southeastern University, Florida: (br). NOAA: OAR/National Undersea Research Program (NURP); Univ. of Hawaii (cra). OSF/photolibrary: Norbert Wu (cla). 224 DK Images: (bl). Image Quest Marine: (c); Y. Kito (br). 224–225 ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (t). 225 ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (cl). OSF/ photolibrary: (br). SeaPics.com: iq3d/Peter Parks (cr). 226 DK Images: Colin Keates (bl/above) (bl). Science Photo Library: Ria Novosti (cra); Sinclair Stammers (cl). 226–227 FLPA: Minden Pictures/ Fred Bavendam (b). 227 The Academy of Natural Sciences: Ted Daeschler (cl). DK Images: Colin Keates (cla) (tr) (cra); Harry Taylor/Courtesy of the Royal Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh (c). SeaPics. com: Doug Perrine (tl). 228 Alamy Images: Natural Visions/Heather Angel (tc). Bridgeman Art Library: Private Collection (cra). DK Images: Harry Taylor/Courtesy of the Hunterian Museum (University of Glasgow) (c); Harry Taylor/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (bc). OSF/ photolibrary: Karen Gowlett-Holmes (br). Science Photo Library: David Parker (clb). 229 Alamy Images: David Fleetham (tc); Stephen Frink Collection/James D. Watt (cra). DK Images: (c/ Terrestrial Mammal) (c/Jawless Fish); Bedrock Studios (c/Armoured Fish) (c/Turtle); Robin Carter (c/ Placodont); Neil Fletcher (c/Penguin); Giuliano Fornari (c/Ichthyosaurus) (c/Plesiosaur); Jon Hughes (c/Whale); Colin Keates (bl) (c/Cambrian) (c/Ediacaran) (c/ Ammonite); Harry Taylor/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (c/Shark); Harry Taylor/ Courtesy of the Royal Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh (c/Lobe-Finned). Getty Images: Science Faction/G. Brad Lewis (br). 230–231 Getty Images: Taxi/Gary Bell. 232 MicroScope/Woods Hole: D. J. Patterson (cb). NOAA: OAR/National Undersea Research Program (NURP); Lousiana Univ. Marine Consortium (cr). Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell (b). OSF/photolibrary: Phototake Inc/Dennis Kunkel (ca). University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign: (cra). 233 DK Images: M.I. Walker (tc). Image Quest Marine: Peter Parks (cl). Oceanwide Images: Rudie Kuiter (bc). Still Pictures: Tom E. Adams (cr). Laura K. Sycuro, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle: (bl). 234 Image Quest Marine: Peter Parks (bc). NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (cb). Still Pictures: Manfred Kage (t); Darlyne A. Murawski (bl). 235 FLPA: D. P. Wilson (cla) (br). Science Photo Library: Jan Hinsch (cb). Visuals Unlimited Inc: Wim van Egmond (cra) (bl). 236 FLPA: D. P. Wilson (b). MicroScope/Woods Hole: Alfred Wegener Institute/Mona Hoppenrath, Alex Kraberg, Tanya Morozova and David Patterson (tr). 237 Karl Embleton/Continuous Plankton Recorder Survey: (c). NASA: LANDSAT (bl). The Natural History Museum, London: (cra). OSF/photolibrary: Michael Pitts/Survival Anglia (tl). 238 Alamy Images: Karsten Wrobel (cr). Algaebase.org: M.D. Guiry (cl). Sue Scott: (crb). 238–239 Sue Scott: (c). 239 Algaebase.org: M.D. Guiry (crb). Sue Scott: (tr) (c). 240 Algaebase.org: M.D. Guiry (cr) (br); John Huisman (cl). Sue Scott: (bl). 241 Alamy Images: Bob Gibbons (t). Algaebase.org: M.D. Guiry (bl). Natural Visions: Heather Angel (br). Sue Scott: (cr). 242–243 Corbis: Ralph A. Clevenger. 244 Algaebase.org: Rob Anderson (crb); Ignacio Bárbara (cla); O. De Clerck (c); M.D. Guiry (bl). Sue Scott: (tr). 245 Algaebase.org: M.D. Guiry (cra). Sue Scott: (cla) (bl) (br). 246 Sue Scott: (cra). 246–247 Image
Quest Marine: Roger Steene (c). 247 Rob Houston: (bc). Sue Scott: (tc) (cr). 248 Algaebase. org: Ignacio Bárbara (cra); Coastal Imageworks/ Colin Bates (bc); M.D. Guiry (tr). Sue Scott: (cl) (cr) (br). 249 Alamy Images: Olivier Digoit (cra); Sami Sarkis (br); Kevin Schafer (tl). Algaebase.org: John Huisman (clb). SeaPics.com: Andrew J. Martinez (crb). 250 Natural Visions: Heather Angel (cra) (bc). Charles J. OKelly: (tc). Science Photo Library: Alexis Rosenfeld (c). 251 Natural Visions: Heather Angel (cl). Jonathan Sleath: (bl) (crb); Dr David Holyoak (cra). 252 Alamy Images: Andrew Woodley (cl). Sue Scott: (bl) (cr) (br). SeaPics. com: Jeremy Stafford-Deitsch (ca). 253 Alamy Images: Nature Picture Library/Jose B. Ruiz (cl); Wildscape/Jason Smalley (cr). Sue Scott: (cla) (b). 254 Alamy Images: Roger Eritja (tr); Marilyn Shenton (tl). OSF/photolibrary: Kathie Atkinson (br). Sue Scott: (bl). US Geological Survey: Forest & Kim Starr (cl). 255 Corbis: FLPA/Peter Reynolds (tc). DK Images: Richard Watson (bl). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Tui De Roy (tl). OSF/ photolibrary: (br). 256 Getty Images: Lonely Planet Images/Grant Dixon (r). MicroScope/ Woods Hole: David Patterson, Linda Amaral Zettler, Mike Peglar and Tom Nerad (fcl). Natural Visions: Heather Angel (bc). OSF/photolibrary: Phototake Inc. (cl). 257 MicroScope/Woods Hole: David Patterson & Aimlee Laderman (br). Einar Timdal/ University of Oslo: (cl) (tr) (cb) (bl). 258 Alamy Images: Brandon Cole Marine Photography (cr); Robert Fried (cla). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Fred Bavendam (bc). Andy Murch/Elasmodiver.com: (br). OSF/photolibrary: (clb). SeaPics.com: Mark Conlin (crb); Doug Perrine (tr). 259 Alamy Images: Dave and Sigrun Tollerton (cla). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Birgitte Wilms (b). SeaPics.com: Phillip Colla (tc). 260 Alamy Images: Andre Seale (cr). Dr. Frances Dipper: (fcl) (cl) (br). Natural Resources Canda: The Sponge Reef Project (clb). 261 Alamy Images: Wolfgang Pölzer (bl). Dr. Frances Dipper: (tr) (ca) (cb). Keith Hiscock: (tl). Prof. Dr. Joachim Reitner/Universität Göttingen: (br). 262 Alamy Images: Tribaleye Images/J. Marshall (cra). OSF/photolibrary: Pacific Stock/David Fleetham (bl). SeaPics.com: Mark Conlin (c); Doug Perrine (cla). 262–263 Getty Images: National Geographic/Paul Nicklen (b). 263 Dr. Frances Dipper: (bc). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (cla). OSF/photolibrary: (cr). SeaPics. com: David Wrobel (ca). 264 Alamy Images: Reinhard Dirscherl (crb). Dr. Frances Dipper: (cb). Sue Scott: (bl). SeaPics.com: iq3-d/Chris Parks (t); David Wrobel (bc). 265 Richard L. Lord. 266 Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (br). SeaPics.com: Jeremy Stafford-Deitsch (cl); Steven Wolper (bc). Still Pictures: Kelvin Aitken (ca). 267 Alamy Images: Andre Seale (clb). Dr. Frances Dipper: (br). NOAA: Mr. Mohammed Al Momany, Aqaba, Jordan (t). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (bc). 268 Alamy Images: Michael Patrick O’Neill (cr) (bl); Wolfgang Pölzer (tc). Sue Scott: (c) (crb). 269 Sue Scott: (cl) (tc) (c) (br). SeaPics.com: Franco Banfi (cr). 270 Alamy Images: Aqua Image (cl). OSF/ photolibrary: Tobias Bernhard (b). SeaPics.com: Masa Ushioda (cra). Dr. Charlie Veron/Australian Institute of Marine Science: Photo by Mary Stafford-Smith (c). 271 Alamy Images: Mark Morgan (cl). Dr. Frances Dipper: (bl). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (crb). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (tr). 272 Alamy Images: Nature Picture Library/Jose B. Ruiz (b). Dr. Frances Dipper: (ca). Sue Scott: (t). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (cr). 273 Alamy Images: FLPA (c). M. Boyer/edge-ofreef.com: (cr) (bl). OSF/photolibrary: Tobias Bernhard (tr). Sue Scott: (br). 274 M. Boyer/ edge-of-reef.com: (cl) (cla) (bl). Courtesy of John J. Holleman: (crb). Michael D. Miller: (tr) (cr). 275 Image Quest Marine: Peter Parks (cr); Roger Steene (cl). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (bl). Kåre Telnes/Seawater.no: (br). 276 Corbis: Lawson Wood (tr). Keith Hiscock: (cb). Image Quest Marine: Roger Steene (ca). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (crb). SeaPics.com: Larry Madrigal (cra). 277 Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery. com): (c). DK Images: Steve Gorton (cla). ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (br). Dr. Dieter Fiege: (tc) (cra). Image Quest Marine: Jim Greenfield (bl). 278 DK Images: Matthew Ward (c) (clb). SeaPics.com: Clay Bryce (ca). 278–279 Getty Images: Image Bank/Mike Severns (c). 279 Alamy Images: Robert Harding Picture Library Ltd/Sylvain Grandadam (tr). Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (cr) (br). DK Images: Andreas Von Einsiedel (cra). OSF/ photolibrary: Karen Gowlett-Holmes (cla) (ca). SeaPics.com: Doc White (c). 280 Alamy Images: Daniel L. Geiger/SNAP (tc); Wildscape/Jason Smalley (tr). SeaPics.com: Mark Strickland (b). 281 Alamy Images: Nature Picture Library/Jose B. Ruiz (ca). Keith Hiscock: (tr). Image Quest Marine: Peter Parks (cra); Scott Tuason (cr). SeaPics.com: John C. Lewis (tl). 282 Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (t). SeaPics.com: Marilyn & Maris Kazmers (bc); Espen Rekdal (cl). 283 DK Images: Andreas von Einsiedel (ca). FLPA: Minden Pictures/AUSCA/D. Parer & E. Parer-Cook (crb). Jon Moore/Coastal Assessment Liaison &
Monitoring, Pembroke: (tl). SeaPics.com: D. R. Schrichte (b). 284–285 Getty Images: Taxi/Pete Atkinson. 286 Alamy Images: Natural Visions/ Heather Angel (cl). DK Images: Dave King (tc); Frank Greenaway/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (bc). FLPA: Minden Pictures/ Norbert Wu (cra). Image Quest Marine: Roger Steene (crb) (br). 287 Alamy Images: Liquid-Light Underwater Photography (br). Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell (t). SeaPics.com: James D. Watt (clb). 288 Alamy Images: Carol Buchanan (tl). Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (c). Marine Wildlife: Lucy Kay (cra). NOAA: National Estuarine Research Reserve Collection (br). 289 Alamy Images: Andre Seale (br). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (t). 290 Corbis: Jeffrey L. Rotman (b). Image Quest Marine: Peter Batson (ca). Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell (cra). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (tl); Jeff Rotman (crb). 291 Alamy Images: f1 online (bl). Image Quest Marine: Peter Batson (bc). Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell (t). SeaPics.com: Marc Chamberlain (br). 292 Alamy Images: Daniel L. Geiger/SNAP (cla). DK Images: Colin Keates/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (cra). NHPA: Ken Griffiths (bl). OSF/photolibrary: Barrie Watts (clb). SeaPics.com: Espen Rekdal (tr). 293 Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (b). Image Quest Marine: Jez Tryner (cla) (ca) (cra). NOAA: Jamie Hall (tr). 294 DK Images: Frank Greenaway/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (cra). Image Quest Marine: Roger Steene (tl). naturepl.com: Christophe Courteau (cl). NOAA: Dr. Bradley Stevens (crb). Still Pictures: Fred Bavendam (tr). 295 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Fred Bavendam (r). NOAA: Hopcroft (bl). SeaPics.com: Franco Banfi (cl). 296 Photo Biopix.dk: (bl). iStockphoto.com: Ian Campbell (br). SeaPics.com: Marli Wakeling (tr). 297 Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www. divegallery.com): (cr). Ifremer (www.ifremer.fr): A. Le Magueresse (clb). Natural Visions: Heather Angel (cl). Still Pictures: Everson (br). 298 Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (b). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (cr). OSF/ photolibrary: (cl). Still Pictures: Lynda Richardson (tr). 299 DK Images: Jane Burton (c); Andreas von Einsiedel (bc); Dave King (cra). Image Quest Marine: Masa Ushioda (crb). David Kusner: (tc). OSF/photolibrary: Green Cape Pty Ltd (bl). 300–301 Steve Smithson. 302 DK Images: Jane Burton (bl). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (cl) (br). SeaPics.com: Masa Ushioda (cr). 303 Alamy Images: Maximilian Weinzierl (tr). DK Images: Kim Taylor & Jane Burton (cr). Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell (tl). SeaPics.com: David B. Fleetham (b). 304 naturepl.com: Jurgen Freund. 305 Corbis: Roger Garwood & Trish Ainslie (tr). SeaPics.com: Ralf Kiefner (c) (crb). 306 Laurent Dabouineau/University U.C.O. Bretagne Nord, France: (cl). FLPA: Foto Natura/Jef Meul (ca). Nature Portfolio (www.natureportfolio.co.uk): Bob Ford (br). 307 Alamy Images: SNAP/Daniel L. Geiger (cl). Karen Gowlett-Holmes: (crb). Marine Wildlife: Lucy Kay (cra). Sue Scott: (bl) (bc). Kåre Telnes/Seawater.no: (tr). 308 SeaPics. com: Phillip Colla (cl). 308–309 Getty Images: Lonely Planet Images/Michael Aw (c). 309 Alamy Images: David Fleetham (tr). Corbis: FLPA/ Douglas P. Wilson (tc). Sue Scott: (br). SeaPics. com: Marli Wakeling (bl). Still Pictures: P. Danna (cr). 310 Alamy Images: David Fleetham (clb). M. Boyer/edge-of-reef.com: (tr). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (crb). Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell (br). Sue Scott: (cla). SeaPics.com: D.R. Schrichte (bl). 311 Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www. divegallery.com): (t). OSF/photolibrary: Tobias Bernhard (bl). Sue Scott: (br). 312 M. Boyer/ edge-of-reef.com: (tr) (cl). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (cr). SeaPics.com: David Wrobel (bl). 313 Dr. Frances Dipper: (bl). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (cl); Colin Keates (cr). Richard Ling: (crb). Charles G. Messing/Nova Southeastern University, Florida: (tr). 314 Alamy Images: F. Jack Jackson (clb). Australian Institute of Marine Science: (t). Dr. Jacob Dafni: Dr. A. Diamant (bc). Image Quest Marine: Peter Herring (br); Roger Steene (cra). 315 Alamy Images: Lawrence Stepanowicz (cra). ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (br). OSF/photolibrary: Stephen Foote (bl). SeaPics.com: Andrew J. Martinez (cl). 316 Corbis: Lawson Wood (clb). FLPA: D. P. Wilson (c). www. uwphoto.no: Erling Svensen (tl) (cra) (br). 317 ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (ca). NOAA: OAR/National Undersea Research Program (NURP); College of William & Mary (tr). SeaPics.com: Scott Leslie (b). 318 FLPA: Foto Natura/Jan Van Arkel (t). Peter Funch, University of Aarhus: (bl). M. Antonio Todaro, University of Modena e Reggio Emilia: (br). 319 Alamy Images: David Fleetham (br). M. Boyer/edge-ofreef.com: (c). ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (tr). Image Quest Marine: Peter Parks (tc). Lyubomir Klissurov: (bl). Still Pictures: Roland Birke (cla). 320 M. Boyer/edge-of-reef.com: (c). ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (cl). Sue Scott: (bc). SeaPics.com: Espen Rekdal (br). 321 M. Boyer/edge-of-reef.com: (cla). Dr. Frances
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acknowledgments Dipper: (cra). Photo by Per R. Flood © Bathybiologica.no: (bc). Natural Visions: Heather Angel (br). Sue Scott: (ca). SeaPics.com: David Wrobel (clb). 322 Corbis: Brandon D. Cole (crb). ExploreTheAbyss.Com: Peter Batson (tr) (bl). SeaPics.com: Jonathan Bird (br). 323 Corbis: Brandon D. Cole (crb). OSF/photolibrary: (tr); Zig Leszcynski (cla). www.uwphoto.no: Erling Svensen (bl). 324 Alamy Images: Brandon Cole Marine Photography (cra). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (cl); James Stevenson (ca). 324–325 Corbis: Denis Scott (b). 325 DK Images: Frank Greenaway (br); Dave King (tc). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (cl) (bc). 326 Janna Nichols: (clb). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (tl) (ca). www.uwphoto.no: Erling Svensen (br). 327 Andy Murch/Elasmodiver.com: (cra). OSF/photolibrary: Paul Kay (bl). Still Pictures: Kelvin Aitken (cla) (crb). 328 Alamy Images: Stephen Frink Collection/Marty Snyderman (br). OSF/photolibrary: Gerard Soury (bl). SeaPics. com: Saul Gonor (cra); Espen Rekdal (cla). 329 Alan Chow: (bc). Dr. Frances Dipper: (br). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (bl). Andy Murch/ Elasmodiver.com: (t). 330 Andy Murch/ Elasmodiver.com: (t) (br) (bc). naturepl.com: Bruce Rasner/Jeff Rotman (cl). 331 Alamy Images: Jeff Rotman (cla). DK Images: Harry Taylor/ Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (cl). John A. Scarlett: (tr). SeaPics.com: Scott Michael (br); David Shen (clb). 332–333 Steve Bloom Images. 334 OSF/photolibrary: Pacific Stock (br). Powder River Photography/Todd Mintz: (cl). SeaPics.com: Richard Herrmann (tl). 335 Alamy Images: David Fleetham (br); Michael Patrick O’Neill (tl). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (bl). naturepl.com: Jeff Rotman (cra). SeaPics. com: Doug Perrine (crb). 336 Image Quest Marine: Carlos Villoch (bl). Andy Murch/ Elasmodiver.com: (br). SeaPics.com: Randy Morse (c). 336–337 Marine Wildlife: Alexander Mustard (t). 337 Alamy Images: M. Timothy O’Keefe (cra). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (clb); Tim Rock (br). 338 Alamy Images: WorldFoto (cra). DK Images: Colin Keates/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (clb). 338–339 Alamy Images: Reinhard Dirscherl (c). 339 Alamy Images: Mark Boulton (br). Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (cb). OSF/ photolibrary: David Fleetham (tr). 340 Alamy Images: Reinhard Dirscherl (bl); Stephen Frink Collection (cl); Images&Stories (tr). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (cla). Naoko Kouchi: (cla/ Background). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (br). 341 Alamy Images: Blickwinkel (bc). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Fred Bavendam (cl). OSF/photolibrary: Dr. F. Ehrenstrom & L. Beyer (ca) (crb). 342 DK Images: Steve Gorton (clb); Colin Keates/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (tc). Getty Images: Taxi/Peter Scoones (cl). Image Quest Marine: Masa Ushioda (crb). SeaPics.com: Mark V. Erdmann (cr). Andreas Svensson/Norwegian University of Science and Technology: (bl). 343 Marine Wildlife: Alexander Mustard (t). Robert A. Patzner, University of Salzburg, Austria: (br). 344 Ardea: Pat Morris (cb). Rick J. Coleman: (bl). DK Images: (cla). Marine Wildlife: Alexander Mustard (tr). Dr. Volker Neumann: (br). 345 DK Images: (clb). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (crb). Marine Wildlife: Alexander Mustard (t). 346 Corbis: Paul A. Souders (bl). OSF/photolibrary: Sue Scott (tl). SeaPics.com: Mark Conlin (c); Jeff Jaskolski (br). 347 Alamy Images: FLPA/S. Jonasson (bl); Andre Seale (tl). SeaPics.com: Shedd Aquar/ Ceisel (cr). 348 Alamy Images: Wolfgang Pölzer (b). Getty Images: National Geographic/Paul Nicklen (t). 349 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (cla). Getty Images: National Geographic/Wolcott Henry (bc). Image Quest Marine: Peter Herring (tr). OSF/photolibrary: Paulo De Oliveira (bl). 350 DK Images: Frank Greenaway (cr). Keith Hiscock: (cra). OSF/photolibrary: Doug Allan (b). SeaPics.com: Hideyuki Utsunomiya (ca). 351 Peter Ajtai: (clb). SeaPics.com: Marilyn & Maris Kazmers (br). www.uwphoto.no: Erling Svensen (cla) (tc). 352 Image Quest Marine: Peter Herring (t); Justin Marshall (br). SeaPics.com: James D. Watt (clb). 353 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (cr). marinethemes.com: Kelvin Aitken (tc). Natural Visions: Peter David (clb). OSF/photolibrary: Neil Bromhall (br); Rodger Jackman (ca). 354 Dr. Frances Dipper: (clb). FLPA: D. P. Wilson (cla). Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell (bc); Rudie Kuiter (crb). OSF/photolibrary: Richard Herrmann (tr). 355 DK Images: Dave King (br). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (l). New Zealand Seafood Industry Council Ltd: (cr). 356 Magnum Photos: Harry Gruyaert . 357 Alamy Images: Charles Bowman (bl); Jeff Rotman (crb). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (ca). naturepl.com: Michael Pitts (cr). OSF/photolibrary: Sue Scott (cb). Sue Scott: (cra). SeaPics.com: Richard Herrmann (br). 358 Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (br). NHPA: A.N.T. Photo Library (t). Robert A. Patzner, University of Salzburg, Austria: (cb). 359 Alamy Images: Papilio/Steve Jones (crb); Wolfgang Pölzer (tl). Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (cl) (bl). 360–361 FLPA: R. Dirscherl. 362 Alamy
Images: Blickwinkel (cr); Reinhard Dirscherl (b). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (cla). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (cl). 363 Dr. Frances Dipper: (bc). DK Images: Jerry Young (tr). OSF/photolibrary: David Fleetham (tl); Pacific Stock (crb). Robert A. Patzner, University of Salzburg, Austria: (clb). SeaPics.com: V&W/Hal Beral (cra). 364 Dr. Frances Dipper: (cla) (br). Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery.com): (cb). DK Images: Frank Greenaway (cra). SeaPics.com: Masa Ushioda (bl). 365 DK Images: Jerry Young (c). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (tc). OSF/photo library: Doug Allan (br). SeaPics.com: Jonathan Bird (cl); Jeremy Stafford-Deitsch (cra). 366–367 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Chris Newbert. 368 Alamy Images: Blickwinkel (br); Wolfgang Pölzer (ca) (bl). DK Images: Jane Burton (cb). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (cla). 369 Alamy Images: Reinhard Dirscherl (tl). DK Images: Geoff Dann (clb); Colin Keates/Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (cr). OSF/photolibrary: Richard Herrmann (bc); Pacific Stock (br). 370 Alamy Images: Reinhard Dirscherl (tc); Sami Sarkis (c). Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery. com): (crb). Marine Wildlife: Alexander Mustard (cra). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (bl). 371 DK Images: Dave King (bl). OSF/photolibrary: Richard Herrmann (br). SeaPics.com: Jez Tryner (tl). 372 Corbis: Staffan Widstrand (cra). DK Images: Dave King (ca). FLPA: Minden Pictures/J. H. Editorial/Cyril Ruoso (cl); Minden Pictures/Tui De Roy (crb). Oceanwide Images: Gary Bell (bc). 373 Getty Images: Image Bank/Tobias Bernhard (b). OSF/photolibrary: Olivier Grunewald (cla). 374 Getty Images: Image Bank/Pete Atkinson (t). Brook Mathews, Sydney: (br). Ilan Ben Tov, Israel: (bl). 375 FLPA: Peter Reynolds (cra); S. A. Team/ Foto Natura (tc). Getty Images: National Geographic/Bill Curtsinger (bl). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (br). 376–377 Harald Slauschek/ UnderwaterVisions.net. 378 Dick Bartlett: (cra). naturepl.com: Constantinos Petrinos (l). Queensland Museum, Australia (www. Qmuseum.qld.gov.au): (br). 379 Getty Images: Taxi/Gary Bell (r). SeaPics.com: Gary Bell (cla); Steve Drogin (clb). 380 Alamy Images: Pep Roig (t). Kraig Haver Photography: (bl). Still Pictures: Michael Fairchild (br). 381 FLPA: Minden Pictures/ Mike Parry (c). Adam Slavický: (bl). Scott Solar/ Amazon Reptile Center: (tl). Dr. Adam P. Summers: (br). Frank Bambang Yuwono: (tr). 382 DK Images: Ken Findlay (clb/Albatross); Chris Gomersall (clb/Curlew); Frank Greenaway/Courtesy of The National Birds of Prey Centre, Gloucestershire (clb/Sea Eagle); Rob Reichenfeld (clb/Pelican). iStockphoto.com: Hans F. Meier (cla). OSF/ photolibrary: Survival Anglia (crb). Still Pictures: Woodfall Wild Images/Everson (bc). 383 Alamy Images: PhotoStockFile/Paul Wayne Wilson (bc). OSF/photolibrary: Doug Allan (t). SeaPics.com: Richard Herrmann (br). 384 Alamy Images: Petr Svarc (cla); WorldFoto (cra). DK Images: (crb); Frank Greenaway (bl). 385 Alamy Images: Malcolm Schuyl (br); David Tipling (bl). DK Images: Steve Gorton (clb); Dave King (cr). Neil Fletcher: Tomi Muukonen (cla). Dr. Paul Hofmann: (c). 386 Alamy Images: Bryan & Cherry Alexander Photography (l). DK Images: Neil Fletcher (br). 387 Alamy Images: Kim Westerskov (bl). Neil Fletcher: Barry Hughes (cra). OSF/photolibrary: Konrad Wothe (clb). SeaPics.com: Hiroya Minakuchi (ca); Kevin Schafer (bc). 388–389 FLPA: Fritz Polking. 390 Alamy Images: INFOCUS Photos/Malie Rich-Griffith (bc). naturepl.com: Peter Reese (cr). OSF/photolibrary: Daniel Cox (tr) (tl). 391 Alamy Images: ImageState/Pete Oxford (bl). Neil Fletcher: Hanne & Jens Eriksen (tr). 392 Alamy Images: George McCallum Photography (ca); INFOCUS Photos/Malie RichGriffith (cb). Neil Fletcher: Hanne & Jens Eriksen (bl); Jonathan Grey (cla); Just Birds (br). 393 Alamy Images: Nature Photographers Ltd/Paul Sterry (crb). Neil Fletcher: George Reszeter (t). SeaPics. com: Doug Perrine (clb). 394 Alamy Images: Barry Bland (tr); Chris Mercer (cl). DK Images: Kim Taylor (fcl). Neil Fletcher: Just Birds (clb). SeaPics.com: Robert Shallenberger (br). 395 Alamy Images: Robert E. Barber (cr); f1 online/ Pölzer (bc). Neil Fletcher: Joe Fuhrman (tl); Mike Read (tr). SeaPics.com: Phillip Colla (br). 396 Alamy Images: Blickwinkel (b). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Tui De Roy (ca) (tr). 397 Alamy Images: WoodyStock/Ingo Schulz (cra). Neil Fletcher: Ian Montgomery (tc); Mike Read (cla). Still Pictures: Fritz Polking (br). 398 Alamy Images: Mike Lane (bl); PhotoStockFile/Paul Wayne Wilson (br). DK Images: Cyril Laubscher (cr); Frank Greenaway/ Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (ca). Neil Fletcher: Barry Hughes (cla). 399 Alamy Images: Bryan & Cherry Alexander Photography (cr); R. & M. Thomas (b). SeaPics.com: Richard Herrmann (tl). Still Pictures: Steve Kaufman (cb); Tom Vezo (tr). 400 Alamy Images: George McCallum Photography (br); The Photolibrary Wales (bl). Neil Fletcher: Just Birds (cl). SeaPics.com: Scott Leslie (tr). 401 Alamy Images: Robert E. Barber (cb); Scott Camazine (tl). DK Images: Cyril Laubscher (br). Neil Fletcher: Joe Fuhrman (bl);
George Reszeter (cra). 402 Alamy Images: Blickwinkel (br). DK Images: Harry Taylor/ Courtesy of the Natural History Museum, London (bc). Neil Fletcher: Dudley Edmonson (cra); Barry Hughes (tc). Getty Images: Image Bank/Roine Magnusson (c). 403 Alamy Images: Kevin Schafer (bl). DK Images: Irv Beckman (crb). OSF/ photolibrary: David Tipling (t). Still Pictures: Mark Edwards (cra). 404 Alamy Images: Brandon Cole Marine Photography (cl). DK Images: Philip Dowell (cr). Marine Wildlife: Doug Allan (bl). Still Pictures: Steven Kazlowski (clb). 404–405 OSF/ photolibrary: Mark Jones (c). 405 Alamy Images: Steven J. Kazlowski (ca). DK Images: James Stevenson & Tina Chambers/Courtesy of the National Maritime Museum, London (crb). OSF/ photolibrary: Pacific Stock (br). 406 DK Images: Jerry Young (tl). FLPA: Foto Natura/Wil Meinderts (br). Howard Hall Productions: (bl). Still Pictures: Norbert Wu (cb). 407 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Tui De Roy (bc). Getty Images: Image Bank/Joseph Van Os (tr). Brian Lockett (www.airand-space.com): (bl). Marine Wildlife: Paul Kay (cla). NOAA: Captain Budd Christman, NOAA Corps (crb). 408 DK Images: Frank Greenaway (cl). FLPA: Panda Photo (crb). Still Pictures: Fred Bruemmer (bl); Woodfall Wild Images/Tapani Rasanen (tr). www.harwoodphotography.co.uk: (cr). 409 NOAA: Jan Roletto/Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary (tl). SeaPics.com: Franco Banfi (br); Kevin Schafer (cr). 410–411 Steve Smithson. 412 Ardea: Francois Gohier (tr). Corbis: The Mariners’ Museum (cl). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Flip Nicklin (bl). SeaPics.com: Howard Hall (bc). 413 Alamy Images: Brandon Cole Marine Photography (t); Stephen Frink Collection/ James D. Watt (b). 414–415 Marine Wildlife: Sue Flood. 416 DK Images: Frank Greenaway (tr). naturepl.com: Doc White (ca). SeaPics.com: Doug Perrine (b). 417 Alamy Images: Andre Seale (cla). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Flip Nicklin (crb). Getty Images: National Geographic/Brian Skerry (tr). SeaPics.com: John K. B. Ford/Ursus (bl). 418 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Flip Nicklin (tr). Getty Images: Stone/Kim Westerskov (bc). SeaPics.com: Thomas Jefferson (cl); Robert L. Pitman (br). 419 Alamy Images: Stock Connection Blue/Tom Brakefield. 420 Marine Wildlife: Sue Flood. 421 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Michio Hoshino (ca); Minden Pictures/Flip Nicklin (cra); Minden Pictures/Norbert Wu (bc). naturepl.com: Todd Pusser (crb). Mike Scott: (cb). SeaPics.com: Phillip Colla (c). 422 FLPA: Minden Pictures/Flip Nicklin (t). Image Quest Marine: Masa Ushioda (br). SeaPics.com: Florian Graner (cl). 423 DK Images: Peter Visscher (crb). FLPA: Minden Pictures/Chris Newbert (tr). Getty Images: Photographer’s Choice/Pete Atkinson (b). Still Pictures: Douglas Faulkner (ca). 424–425 NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC. 428 Alamy Images: Bryan & Cherry Alexander Photography (cla); LOOK Die Bildagentur der Fotografen GmbH (cb). 430 Alamy Images: Jack Stephens (cla). Corbis: Lowell Georgia (cra). 431 Alamy Images: Nordicphotos/Kristjan Fridriksson (br). 432 Alamy Images: Greenshoots Communications (c); David Sanger Photography (cla). Corbis: Ralph White (bl). 434 Alamy Images: FLPA (br). 435 DK Images: David Lyons (cl). NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (ca). 436 Alamy Images: Ace Stock Ltd (bc); allOver photography (clb). DK Images: Linda Whitwam (ca). 437 Alamy Images: Nick Hanna (br). 438 Mads Eskesen. 439 Alamy Images: Mike Lane (br). Mads Eskesen: (tr) (cra). Horns Rev Havmøllepark (www.hornsrev.dk): Medvind Fotografi/Bent Sørensen (bc). Nysted Havmøllepark (www.nystedhavmoellepark.dk): (crb). 441 Alamy Images: Wild Places Photography/Chris Howes (br). Corbis: Sygma/ Bernard Annebicque (cr). 442 DK Images: Christopher & Sally Gable (tl); John Heseltine (br). 443 Alamy Images: Vehbi Koca (crb); Rob Rayworth (bl). NASA: Image courtesy NASA/ GSFC/MITI/ERSDAC/JAROS, and U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team (c). 444 Corbis: (tr) (bl); Sygma/Harford Chloe (cb). NASA: Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA/GSFC (br). 446 Corbis: Cordaiy Photo Library Ltd/John Farmar (tr). NASA: GSFC/JPL,
MISR Team (bl). Science Photo Library: Southampton Oceanography Centre/B. Murton (cla). 447 Alamy Images: Wild Places Photography/Chris Howes (cra). Corbis: (ca). 448 FLPA: Colin Monteath (br). iStockphoto.com: Patrick Roherty (bc). 449 Alamy Images: Bryan & Cherry Alexander Photography (bl). NASA: Jesse Allen, NASA Earth Observatory and the HIGP Thermal Alerts Team (cr). NOAA: Lieutenant Philip Hall, NOAA Corps (br). 450 Corbis: Yann ArthusBertrand (bl); Reuters/Supri (cla). Still Pictures: Friedrich Stark (c). 452 Alamy Images: Blickwinkel (bc); Tor Eigeland (tr). Corbis: Jonathan Blair (cl). 453 Alamy Images: Images of Africa Photobank/ Peter Williams (tr). 454 Alamy Images: Neil McAllister (br). 455 Alamy Images: Julio Etchart (cra). 456 Getty Images: AFP. 457 Corbis: Reuters/U.S. Navy/Philip A. McDaniel (cra); Reuters/Tarmizy Harva (br). Images acquired and processed by CRISP, National University of Singapore: (tc) (ca). Getty Images: AFP/Sena Vidanagama (crb). NOAA: (cb). 459 iStockphoto. com: Wesley Drake (cra). OSF/photolibrary: Michael Brooke (br). 460 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (cla). Corbis: Ralph White (bc). NOAA: Commander Richard Behn, NOAA Corps (cl). 462 NASA: George Riggs, NASA GSFC (cra). US Fish and Wildlife Service National Image Library: Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge/Kevin Bell (cla). 463 Corbis: Neil Rabinowitz (tc). 464 Alamy Images: FocusRussia (cra); Iain Masterton (cl). Corbis: Michael S. Yamashita (crb). 466 Alamy Images: Chris Willson (br). 467 Still Pictures: Henning Christoph (cra). 469 Alamy Images: Andre Seale (br). Corbis: Douglas Faulkner (cr); Reuters/Alex De La Rosa (tr). 470 Still Pictures: Richard J. Wainscoat (cra). 471 Alamy Images: Dennis Hallinan (bc). 472 OSF/photolibrary: Tammy Peluso (tr). 473 iStockphoto.com: Angela Bell (cla). SeaPics.com: Gary Bell (tc). 474 Getty Images: AFP/Tarik Tinazay. 475 Alamy Images: Nick Hanna (bl); Images&Stories (cra). Corbis: Stephen Frink (br); Jeffrey L. Rotman (bc); Lawson Wood (crb). Getty Images: Image Bank/Zac Macaulay (tr). OSF/photolibrary: David Fleetham (ca). 477 Alamy Images: Danita Delimont (cra); INTERFOTO Pressebildagentur (cb). 478 OSF/ photolibrary: Mike Hill (br). 479 iStockphoto. com: Michal Wozniak (tr). 480 Alamy Images: LOOK Die Bildagentur der Fotografen GmbH (cl); Bruce Percy (br). Corbis: Paul A. Souders (cra). 482 Alamy Images: Bryan & Cherry Alexander (cl). Still Pictures: Norbert Wu (cla) (bc). 484 Corbis: Eye Ubiquitous/C. M. Leask (cra). NOAA: Commander John Bortniak, NOAA Corps (cla). 485 Alamy Images: Blickwinkel (bl); Kim Westerskov (br). 486 Ardea: Edwin Mickleburgh. 487 Alamy Images: Graphic Science (tr); Steve Morgan (ca). NASA: MODIS Land Science Team (cra); Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Land Science Team (br); NASA/ GSFC/LaRC/JPL, MISR Team (crb). JACKET IMAGES: Front: Getty Images: Visuals Unlimited/David Wrobel. Back: Alamy Images: Fabrice Bettex (ftl); DeepSeaPhotography.Com: Kim Westerskov (ftr); Getty Images: Image Bank/ Don & Liysa King (b); Lonely Planet Images/Peter Hendrie (tr); Science Faction/Flip Nicklin (tl). Spine: Dive Gallery/Jeffrey Jeffords (www.divegallery. com). Front Flap: Corbis: Jeffrey L. Rotman. Back Flap: Getty Images: Photonica/Anna Grossman. Data for the bathymetric maps in the Atlas of the Oceans chapter provided by Planetary Visions based on ETOPO2 global relief data, SRTM30 land elevation data, and the Generalised Bathymetric Chart of the Ocean. ETOPO2 published by the U.S. Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Geophysical Data Center, 2001. SRTM30 published by NASA and the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, 2005, distributed by the U.S. Geological Survey. GEBCO One Minute Grid reproduced from the GEBCO Digital Atlas published by the British Oceanographic Data Centre on behalf of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO and the International Hydrographic Organisation, 2003. All other images © Dorling Kindersley For further information, see www.dkimages.com
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The American Museum of Natural History in New York City is one of the world’s preeminent scientific, educational, and cultural institutions. Since its founding in 1869, the Museum has advanced its global mission to explore and interpret human cultures and the natural world through a wide-reaching program of scientific research, education, and exhibitions. The institution houses 45 permanent exhibition halls, state-of-the-art research laboratories, one of the largest natural history libraries in the Western Hemisphere, the Rose Center for Earth and Space featuring the Hayden Planetarium, and a permanent collection of more than 30 million specimens and cultural artifacts. With a scientific staff of more than 200, the Museum supports research divisions in Anthropology, Paleontology, Invertebrate and Vertebrate Zoology, and the Physical Sciences. Visit www.amnh.org to explore the Museum’s extensive collections, exhibitions, and online educational resources
